WORKING WITH KOANS A Talk by John Tarrant Given at a Sesshin at St Dorothy’s Rest in Camp Meeker, California 1 July 2004 A koan is a piece of old wisdom in a very concise form. I think of it as a vial of ancient light that has been passed down to us. It’s the same light that was in the heart of the teacher who invented the koan. So, if you can get the vial open, what will pour... Read more

Somewhere in my late adolescence I stumbled upon a copy of T. E. Lawrence’s memoir Seven Pillars of Wisdom. It said on the title page it was a first edition and the used book dealer who was offering it said it would be a great first aquisition for an aspiring book collector. I wasn’t sure I wanted to be a book collector (and indeed would instead become a book accumulator, a horse of a very different color), but ever since... Read more

Wandering around the Buddhist blogosphere I ran across a story that purports to be out of the Zen tradition. Frankly, I’ve never encountered it before and am a bit suspicious about its origins. Although I also have to admit it does contain a message I think commonly held to be “Zen.” It goes somewhat like this. A senior student decides it is time for him to be acknowledged as a master of the Zen way and goes to his teacher... Read more

On this day in 1553 the lawyer, physician, theologian, humanist and most significantly, anti-trinitarian polemicist, Michael Servetus was arrested in Geneva on the orders of the theocrat John Calvin. It all goes downhill for Servetus from here. But not for his ideas… Read more

The conviction of Nobel Peace Laureate Aung San Suu Kyi on trumped up charges stemming from a mentally unstable admirer’s swim to her home to see her was completely expected. This allows the dictators to remove her as a direct influence on the upcoming elections. By officially halving the sentence and continuing to allow her to live under house arrest the dictators hope to fool the world. And no doubt some will be fooled. But, the sadness of Burma’s fate... Read more

If you ever wondered what Monkey Mind does in his spare time… (Thank you, Jon Stewart) Read more

I found the following on the web. I largely agree with it, although there is something about our sacred institutions that are a bit more lively than I feel it suggests. Still, a good reflection and worth sharing… I think of religious institutions as government bureaucracies. They’re like the postal service. The are usually big, full of all sorts of annoying people, rather stuck in their ways, and if you work there you may be required to wear a funny... Read more

In response to various complaints, including some generated at this blog, Tim Horton’s has withdrawn its support of an anti gay marriage event here in Rhode Island. I’ve deleted the original posting and instead cite Tim Horton’s official statement… Tim Hortons responds to inquiries about Rhode Island event sponsorship Recently, Tim Hortons was approached in Rhode Island to provide free coffee and products for a local event, as we do thousands of times a year across Canada and the United... Read more

The light beneath sleep Sometimes, underneath deep sleep is a certain diffused glow, as, in the rainforest, luminous toadstools glow green among the leaf litterand beetles crawl about with winking abdomens. One night when I followed this glow I came to an upturned tree that was a kind of cathedral for glowworms and the light beat against my face, my chest and my hands. At the end of the corridor of sleep, a dream stands. It may be that at... Read more

Once again over at my Unitarian Universalist minister’s chat the subject of godtalk has overwhelmed the board. It is interesting. I freely admit. Two decades ago a UU minister who used the word God in the pulpit could be in trouble with the congregation. A decade ago I casually mentioned in the pulpit my own nontheism and found myself visited by elders who were worried that people might misunderstand what I meant… Today you can find ministers who think hard... Read more