The members of Portland’s Bright Way Zen have fulfilled their dream of getting a dedicated space. The new location, on Portland, Ore.’s west side, is near the city of Beaverton and also serves the surrounding areas of Hillsboro and Aloha. For the last four years, Bright Way Zen has met in a space that was generously donated by Christ United Methodist Church in Cedar Mill, west of Portland. Bright Way members turned a classroom at the church into a zendo, and even set up their meeting space in the church’s pre-school classrooms. Bright Way members would move their materials to…
Three Theravada Buddhist monks are living from daily alms rounds just as the Buddha did, at a small monastery they’ve established outside White Salmon, Wash. Pacific Hermitage was established in July 2010 by three monks from Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery in Redwood Valley, Calif., who sought a place where three to five monks could practice and live simply in a very traditional way. The monastery and hermitage practice in the Thai Forest Tradition of the late Ajahn Chah, a revered 20th Century meditation master from northeast Thailand, who was also the teacher of Spirit Rock, Calif. teacher Jack Kornfield. It is…
(Editor’s note: This spring, a group of Seattle University seniors embarked on a high-intensity exploration of engaged Buddhism, culminating in creation of a Buddhist “field guide.” This is their story, told by student Jack Hamrick.)
For college seniors, the final term of the final year typically means nice weather and, should you be so fortunate, an easy course load to match. In other words, plenty of opportunity to coast to the end and enjoy the final weeks of that sweet collegiate freedom before “reality” hits after graduation.
But this wasn’t the case for me and the nine other seniors enrolled in Professor Sharon Suh’s “Engaged Buddhism” course. From the start it was clear: “You will not be coasting to graduation.”…
Most of us have been to birthday parties where we were told, “Don’t bring any presents – just bring yourself!” But, have you ever been to a birthday party where you had to go through a metal detector to make sure you had complied with this request?
On May 12, while visiting inmates of the Washington State Reformatory Unit of the Monroe Correctional Complex, eight of us had to be scanned before we could enter, and we had to empty our pockets and leave even our keys behind.
Traveling to the little city of Monroe, approximately 35 miles north and east of Seattle, we visited a small sangha, or practice community, of Buddhist men who were celebrating the Buddha’s birthday…
An Artist Explores Perhaps my work as a Buddha-maker began about a decade ago when I was in the market for a Buddha to use for a home altar. I viewed line-ups of concrete Buddhas at garden shops, and plastic or bronze Buddhas at new age gift shops. Looking online, over 16,000 Buddhas vied for my attention.
I had been hoping to find something … more unique, something that might reflect a modern and Western sensibility. Most of the Buddhas I found had a sameness to them, which for me, begged a couple of questions: What does (can, should) a Buddha look like, and why? What does equanimity look like? What does enlightenment look like?
Originally the Buddha instructed his…
Holding Earth Sangha both honors and plays with Buddhist forms. Exploratory in nature, we gather along the edges, share leadership, and create bubbles of subversion in the smooth Zen facade. Our practice group, which we call an ecosangha, evolved within us as we started building our home on South Whidbey Island two years ago. In a forest setting among cedars and firs, our rustic facility hosts a sitting practice group, writing workshops, and prayer circles, the latter led by Christopher Diggins. He is my husband and partner in Holding Earth, and a psychotherapist in Seattle who uses a mindfulness practice…
Written by Timothy O'Brien
The board of Northwest Dharma Association includes directors who live in various parts of the region, currently the Seattle area, Olympia, the Portland area, and Eastern Washington. The board meets in person twice a year. In the summer the new board takes office and reviews the association’s work since the last Strategic Planning Meeting, which is the other in-person meeting, and which takes place in the fall. This year’s first meeting of the new board occurred on Sunday, June 10, at Open Gate Zendo in Olympia, the home of R.L. (“Miles”) Miles, the incoming board president, and his wife Kathy…
Mindfulness techniques developed using a web-based platform in a new study, are helping adults meet weight loss goals and reduce unhealthy eating. While the program is backed by medical research, it is also aligned with the Buddha’s 12 links of dependent origination, which show how we’re trapped in a repetitive cycle due to our attractions and our habits of acting on them. More on that later. Achieving and maintaining weight loss is a major challenge for many people. My colleagues at Kaiser Permanente Washington Health Research Institute in Seattle, and Brown University in Rhode Island, recognized a paucity of weight-loss…
