Here is a BBC report. And from the New York Times. And, of course, images often are vastly more important than words: Read more

Today marks two distinctive moments in Western religious history, at least as I see such things. The first of these important moments, I feel, is how today is the seventy-eighth anniversary of the first consciously Humanist religious service, held at the Steinway Hall in New York City and conducted by the remarkable Unitarian minister Charles Francis Potter, one of the signal figures in the development of a spiritual humanist perspective. (Despite what can be interpreted as the assertions of the... Read more

One of the more stunning bits of recent bureaucratic mismanagement at the Federal level is how they have decided they will provide lists of books addressing religious subjects that will be allowed in prison libraries. All other religious books will be removed. (No word on what happens to them, yet. Anyone think matches will be involved?) There are no Unitarian Universalist titles. No doubt because UUs don’t go to prison… Yeah. Sure… (Sorry for the tone. I guess this puts... Read more

Sign Amnesty’s International’s petition to George W. Bush, asking him to urge the U.N. Security Council members to immediately deploy a mission to Myanmar and take other necessary steps. Visit the Tricycle Editors’ Blog, where they have posted a list of actions from the U.S. Campaign for Burma. Visit Voices for Burma’s “How Can You Help?” page for another good list of suggested actions. Sign that Avaaz.org petition if you haven’t already. Thank you, Danny! Also an official statement from... Read more

There should be no doubt there are many good introductions to Zen Buddhism in the English language. For ages the best was without a doubt The Three Pillars of Zen edited by Philip Kapleau. My personal favorite for many years and it certainly remains high on my list is Robert Aitken’s Taking the Path of Zen. Heck, I’ve even entered the field with a general introduction or two… But I remain confident if you’re going to read one book the... Read more

And they say heroes don’t walk among us… After the monks and nuns came to her where she has resided for so long under house arrest the generals ordered her taken away. Right now we don’t know where she is… Read more

This morning the BBC reported at least nine people have been killed in the most recent attacks by the military on the protesting monastic community and their supporters. And here’s the New York Times on the subject a little later in the day. Read more

I’ve just finished reading The Search for the Buddha: The Men Who Discovered India’s Lost Religion, by Charles Allen and published by Carroll & Graff in 2002. While there are moments of rough slogging, I very much recommend it. In addition to it being a straight forward exploration of the eighteenth and nineteenth century British officers who pretty much in their spare time first caught on to the fact that Buddhism’s origins were in fact in India, gradually understood what... Read more

As I write this blood is beginning to pour onto the streets of Burma. (And more here) The peaceful protests of the Buddhist monastic community in the country renamed Myanmar by its jackbooted dictators has been met with clubs and guns. Last week I wrote a sermon reflecting on pacifism and considering how to live as if peace mattered. I said then I wasn’t settled on the matter. I remain unsettled. And, and I stand in awe of Burma’s monastic... Read more

This morning I pulled my old copy of Ranier Maria Rilke’s Book of Hours off the shelf. I plan on quoting one of his poems in that volume for Sunday’s sermon. I found a note in my hand stuck into the space between pages 56 and 57. It mentioned how my old mentor, the Unitarian Universalist minister Dan O’Neal as he struggled with cancer in the last months of his life had memorized the poem “You, Darkness, of Whom I... Read more