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monkeymind

2019-01-19T08:37:27-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Enter Edgar Allan Poe

Last updated on: January 19, 2019 at 8:37 am   By James Ford

    One of the small pleasures of our fourteen years in old New England was finding how my life rubbed elbows with various public figures of present and past. When we were in Providence, especially, it was not possible to avoid crossing paths with the mayor and the governor, the two senators, and the two House representatives. Several even came to recognize me and two probably could recall my name without an aide’s prompt. But its the dead ones... Read more

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Edgar Allan Poe

Providence

Sarah Helen Whitman

2023-02-26T16:50:45-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Zen Come West: A Passing Reflection on Emerging Opportunities & Dangers

Last updated on: February 26, 2023 at 4:50 pm   By James Ford

      As it turns out Rick McDaniel has a new book coming out, The Story of Zen. And he invited the Zen teacher Dosho Port to write an afterword for it. Always looking for the easier way Port Roshi posted a query to Facebook asking what any of his Zen friends might consider the single greatest challenge together with the single greatest opportunity for Zen in the West today? A compelling question. And, I believe, timely. We are... Read more

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challenges

opportunities

Zen

Zen in the West

2019-01-16T11:11:19-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A Zen Priest Reflects on the Flower Sermon: Gateless Gate, Case 6

Last updated on: January 16, 2019 at 11:11 am   By James Ford

        Once upon a time the world honored one was at Vulture Peak. Before a vast crowd of lay practitioners, nuns, and monks, angelic creatures, and even gods, he held up a single flower and twirled it. Of the assembled crowd only the disciple Mahakashyapa, responded, breaking into a wide grin. The Buddha, lord of wisdom, physician of the heart, announced “I have the eye treasury of the true Dharma, the marvelous mind of nirvana, the true form of no-form, the... Read more

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Case 6

Flower Sermon

Gateless Gate

Zen

2019-01-14T12:01:08-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A Western Zen priest’s Random Collection of Favorite Songs of Longing, Loss, Hope, and Finding…

Last updated on: January 14, 2019 at 12:01 pm   By James Ford

A Western Zen priest’s Random Collection of Twenty Favorite Songs of Longing, Loss, Hope, and Finding… I am a Boomer, so, of course the Dawning of the Age of Aquarius But of songs from that era, it’s probably George Harrison’s My Sweet Lord that most captures the moment and my heart I recall going to my first settlement as a Unitarian Universalist minister, attending a lay led service at a largely humanist congregation. They were enthralled with Amazing Grace and... Read more

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favorite songs

secular hymns

spirituality

Zen

2019-01-13T13:15:29-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

On the Utter, Complete, Total Ordinariness of Mu: A Meditation on One of Zen’s Most Famous Koans

Last updated on: January 13, 2019 at 1:15 pm   By James Ford

          On the Utter, Complete, Total Ordinariness of Mu James Myoun Ford Empty Moon Zen (a version of this talk is published in The Book of Mu) The Case A monk asked Chao-chou, “Has the dog Buddha nature or not?” Chao-chou said, “Mu.” Wu-Men’s Comment For the practice of Zen it is imperative that you pass through the barrier set up by the Ancestral Teachers. For subtle realization it is of the utmost importance that you... Read more

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koan

Mu

no

Zen

2019-01-11T08:42:19-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Enter Alexander Hamilton

Last updated on: January 11, 2019 at 8:42 am   By James Ford

    Alexander Hamilton was born on this day, the 11th of January, in 1755, or, maybe it was 1757 in the British West Indies… He would go on to be chief of staff to General George Washington, founder of America’s financial system, a principal author of the Federalist Papers, founder of the US Coast Guard, founder of the New York Post, and first Secretary of the Treasury. Small wonder his story could become the subject of a Broadway musical.... Read more

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Alexander Hamilonb

Alexander Hamilton

2019-01-10T17:23:40-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Crossing a Rubicon

Last updated on: January 10, 2019 at 5:23 pm   By James Ford

    Traditionally we mark today, then 10th of January, in the 49th year before our common era as the day that Julius Caesar crossed the river Rubicon. Suetonius says that as his army began to cross Caesar declared, “Alea iacta est!” The die has been cast… It has come to be a common enough expression in our culture. And… Not a bad moment for us, you and me, to consider is there a river for us to cross? To... Read more

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Caesar

Decision

Rubicon

2019-01-08T09:22:33-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

Thinking of Saint Death, Her Cult, and the Mysteries of the Human Heart

Last updated on: January 8, 2019 at 9:22 am   By James Ford

          I find myself thinking of folk religions today. And especially I’m reminded in the moment of  Santa Muerte, Saint Death, or Holy Death, or most formally Our Lady of the Holy Death. I’ve written of her before, and I’m drawing on some earlier thoughts here gathered together with some thoughts about our human condition and how we engage it. I admit while I am fascinated with religions, until relatively recently I’ve pretty much ignored this... Read more

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death

Kali

New Religions

Saint Death

Santa Muerte

2019-01-06T09:51:24-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

A Small Zen Meditation on the Festival of the Epiphany

Last updated on: January 6, 2019 at 9:51 am   By James Ford

    In the Christian calendar, at least some forms of it, today is the Feast of the Epiphany, or Three King’s Day. Some years ago my spouse Jan and I were talking about that hymn associated with the feast of the epiphany, “We Three Kings,” when she shivered and shared her recollection of that year when she was about eleven and the costumes her mother dressed her, her sister and her brother in and the rickety church stage where... Read more

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Feast of the Epiphany

Three Kings

Zen

2019-01-06T08:52:14-08:00

LOGO Patheos Explore the world's faith through different perspectives on religion and spirituality! Patheos has the views of the prevalent religions and spiritualities of the world.

One Hundred & Four Years of Alan Watts

Last updated on: January 6, 2019 at 8:52 am   By James Ford

          One hundred and four years ago on this day, the 6th of January, 1915 Alan Wilson Watts was born in a village that is now a part of London. Searching my blog I note I referenced him in fifty-five different postings over the past decade. This becomes my fifty-sixth revisit. No doubt Mr Watts is an important figure in my life. And, more important I think he stands as a significant figure in the meeting of... Read more

Alan Watts

Alan Watts

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