Turning Sunday Morning

Rather than sleep in on this Sunday morning, I awoke early. My kids are away on vacation with their mother, no zen activities were scheduled, and my partner was sleeping soundly. I quietly made coffee, reviewed for the Thursday night Dogen study group, and then was about to begin one of my summer reading projects, The Power of Denial: Buddhism, Purity, and Gender by Bernard Faure when I found the current issue of Turning Wheel: Journal of Socially Engaged Buddhism on the coffee table. My subscription lapsed some years ago so I don’t know how this issued found its way here.

The focus is on Burma, “The Revolution of the Spirit,” and given the heartaching situation there, I flipped it open. I was moved first by Stephanie Kaza’s short piece, “The Smallest Monastery,” where she touchingly recounts finding a sweet practice zone while viewing Thomas Merton’s art in Angelic Mistakes: The Art of Thomas Merton while flying from LA to Vermont.

The next piece that caught my eye was by one of my favorite Buddhist writers, David Loy, titled “Buddhist Resistance to Oppression?” Loy explores what the Buddha had to say about responding to oppression by a state like Burma. Loy concludes:

“For half a century, nonviolent resistance by Tibetans has had little success against Chinese domination and colonization. The greed of China, Southeast Asia, and the West for Burma’s vast natural resources means that, although concerns have sometimes been expressed, these countries don’t care much what happens as long as a stable business environment prevails.”

Someone in the journal also notes that the Burmese military is apparently dealing with Aung San Suu Kyi’s by waiting until her death, much like the Chinese wait for the Dalai Lama to die. Can nonviolent resistance be effective in such cases? Maybe not. Not in the short run. But the alternative is to become the oppressor rather than put the oppressor in our shoes.

Hozan Alan Senauke reports on a recent trip to Burma in “Journey to a Land Cloaked in Fear.” Even before the cyclone, Senauke tells of the desolate and desperate conditions for the people and the absence of many monks since the 2007 uprising.

Another striking piece is an interview with Sayadaw U Kovinda, an 81 year-old monk who has been involved in protests against the military since 1990, turning over the alms bowl and not accepting donations from the military. He sees his protests as following the vinaya rule. Imprisoned for 22 months in the early 90’s in squalid conditions (“even a pig would stay away from this food!” he says), U Kovinda reports that the worst thing was being disrobed.

The interview ends with strong confidence that democracy will come soon if all the world’s people offered their help.

If you want to help, Hozan Alan Senauke recommends the Foundation for the People of Burma (where Jack Kornfield & he serve on the board). FPB, www.foundationburma.org/, has raised more than $400,000 recently, taking no overhead. They have direct means of personally transferring funds into Burma, and a volunteer staff of 300 getting food, medicine, and money right to those in needs.