A word on some of what has happened recently. I imagine news of the nature of my thoughts on this weblog has garnered me some new and unexpected audience members, hungry for at the least an explanation of the events leading up to what became an unfortunate misunderstanding between myself and a certain group of fellow human beings. I am sorry to say I will not satiate this desire; sorry only in the sense that one might wish to do one’s best to oblige the thirsts of others. But this story will have to lay unwritten. I was asked, ordered even, to at the very least post a revised version of my thoughts on the proper role of a Buddhist monastery in regards to the rest of human society and the proper every day attitude, behaviour and comportment of a Buddhist monk; revised, that is, from a recent post I put up briefly and quickly took down, though not quick enough.
Continue reading Temple or Monastery
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Every form of addiction is bad, no matter whether the narcotic be alcohol or morphine or idealism. –Carl Jung Human beings are a funny lot. We pride ourselves on our ability to parse stimuli rationally and yet we rarely, if ever, accomplish the task. Take the Internet, for instance. As fascinating as [...] From the Beating-a-Dead-Horse Dept: Not to compare religions out of context, but, regarding the following video: The noun forgiveness has 2 senses: 1. forgiveness — (compassionate feelings that support a willingness to forgive) 2. forgiveness, pardon — (the act of excusing a mistake or offense) Forgiveness in Christianity: ” ‘If a man [...] Although this matter has been cleared up within the Thai press, it seems that the article in English has stirred up and agitated Western readers. This has been caused by some misrepresentations of the events of the press conference and the editorial language used in the article. Wat Nong Pah Pong feels that it [...] More fun with Buddhist Monasticism. So I really did think a bit about the whole woman ordination thing while in the forests of Thailand… here’s some more thoughts: It seems pretty clear in my mind that we (men monks) shouldn’t be eager to ordain women; it doesn’t say much of an ascetic that he [...] I really don’t have enough time to do justice to this topic, and probably should have known better than to stick my nose into it so close to a trip abroad, but hopefully I can just close up here with a few points that I’ve come up with, maybe right, maybe wrong. First, some [...] An interesting discussion on the Second Life VR platform: Let me tell you of the sad reality of Second Life. In case your not familiar with Second Life its a virtual world where über good looking people in tank tops and fishnet stockings run around having virtual sex, virtual lives and virtual Buddhism. In [...] Here’s my opinion on the Bhikkhuni thing: I think we should look at the options… breaking rules is not cool, ever. But there are ways of changing the rules I think, at least temporarily… the Buddha left the sangha in charge and, as I said, I don’t see any reason for not putting it [...] On my ordination day, I thought, “I’m the perfect monk.” After about a month of messing up, I realized that I really had been mistaken, but now I was a really good monk, after one month. Then, a year later, I realized I’d really been naive. But now, one year into it, I was [...] Before my last post garners any more response, I thought I’d clear it up a little… My purpose in writing is not to whine, just to explain. Please don’t write to me offering constructive criticism on how to improve my relationship with cultural Buddhism. It’s a dysfunctional relationship that will never be repaired. I [...] |
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