Though they live as monastics, these Buddhist women in Burma cannot ordain
There is a huge movement going on in Buddhism today, one that could make Buddhism the only major world religion with gender equal access to ordination in nearly all denominations. All over the Buddhist world, women are battling for full ordination of nuns, something that is now only consistently available in one tradition and is hotly debated in the others. It’s also shockingly overlooked outside of these debates.
Consider an audience member’s question during a wonderful presentation by David Loy and Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi at the recent NSP conference. A long-time activist who’d been involved in Buddhism for a decade and a half wondered why most Buddhists aren’t also activists. The man noted that there were some exceptions, such as Thich Nhat Hanh, and “monks in Burma who were slaughtered, Tibetan monks who were slaughtered,” but that was about it. The way he phrased his question – and the way it was answered – is problem that must be addressed before we can consider other aspects of Buddhist activism.
Did you notice who was missing in those examples? David Loy didn’t catch it, and he’d just been talking about how a fear of death and nature relates to denigration of women. Neither did Venerable Bhikkhu Bodhi, who is a fantastic supporter of women’s rights. Oh, but maybe the term “monk” was meant include “nun” too, so Tibetan nuns passionately engaged in nonviolent resistance weren’t being ignored. (We’ll get to the question of nuns in Burma in a minute). The term “monks” implies the subset of “nuns,” just like “man” includes the subset of women, right?
Take a look at this 20-minute video of Sam Daley-Harris talking about his work lobbying for social change and advocating for microcredit to help assist the poor. You will probably get a healthier jolt of inspiration and energy than from another espresso or Red Bull.
Sally Bjornsen, the founder of the Great American Apparel Diet, said she was prompted to stop buying clothes for a simple reason: “I was sick and tired of consumerism,” she said.
Tilda Swinton in the memorable 1990s film "Orlando" which is being re-released tomorrow
By Ralph Seliger
“Orlando” is a 1992 film of exceeding crispness and beauty, being re-released on July 23. Spoiler alert: because of the paucity of dialogue and plot, I provide more detail than I normally would in a review, but I suggest that this is not a problem. Its plot basically serves as a vehicle for conveying a memorable cinematic experience.
Yet since nothing other than the fantastic seems to happen, this is not for moviegoers who only appreciate realism. For those who can enjoy more, it’s remarkable for (among other things) a stately pace that never seems to drag.
It’s a surreal tale, taken from the Virginia Woolf novel of the same name, which depicts the title character, the son of a high-ranking English nobleman, blessed by Queen Elizabeth I in her old age to “never wither.” He lives on for 400 years and counting, but mostly as a woman.
This post was inspired by an email I received two days ago: “Where does shame come from …? How can we approach it so we can eventually free ourselves from it? What works for you? What did you see working for others? Anything alive in you around this topic that might serve other readers as well?”
I don’t really know where shame comes from, so I can only share my opinions and conjectures about it (and I tend to have those about almost anything). My sense about shame is that it’s a primary mode of punishment, a way that adults instill forms of behavior in children who then internalize it and grow up carrying enormous amounts of shame in them. If you look at the language, adults will often say, most literally: “shame on you.” In Israel, where I grew up, the equivalent expression translates into: “Be ashamed of yourself.” In both cases the adult is commanding the child to experience shame as a way of expressing their unhappiness with how the child acted.
Shame is in the category of what are called social emotions, and is deeply connected to our sense of belonging and being loved. If we are shamed often and deeply enough, we end up feeling shame about our very desire to be loved and accepted. Shame is endemic in this culture, and has consequences beyond the pain that it brings to those who feel it. Profound shame is one of the most common experiences of very violent people, a tragic finding to which I have already alluded (see my post Nonviolence and Living Undefendedly). If Gilligan is accurate in his understanding of violence, then overcoming shame goes beyond feeling better – it may well be an essential condition for a violence-free society.
Is it possible for one city to become a model for restorative justice? Can you imagine a ten year plan to make it happen? I don’t know what that might look like but I really want to hear from people who have ideas about it. Here’s an article Edwin Rutsch sent me describing the work of a number of people in Santa Cruz, California, who have that dream for their city. They say that the cities of Hull, England and Rochester, New York have already become “Restorative Cities.” I don’t have time to follow that up — have a zillion things to do for our next print issue of Tikkun — but would be delighted if anyone who knows or has time to research it could tell me (email me at dave@tikkun.org, or leave a comment below).
Last month I was honored to attend and participate in a Multi-Faith Pride Service at the Unity Church of the Hills in Austin, Texas. Organized by Reverend Mary Street Wilson of the Church of the Savior, almost every major faith tradition in Austin was represented at the event with an attendance of more than 300 people. The program included readings from sacred texts, musical performances, and prayers.
One of the highlights was a three-part group chant that the entire audience joined in, based on the three Abrahamic Faiths. Reverend Wilson told me that this was the most powerful moment for her in the service because, “Each ‘voice’ expressed a particular faith tradition and was beautiful in its own right, but the harmony of can only be achieved through multiple voices. The harmony is a reminder of how multiple faith traditions can work together to achieve a greater beauty than anyone of us might achieve on our own.”
She continued, “I just happen to believe that the Sacredness we believe in surpasses human expression. And yet, the Ireneaus quote, ‘The glory of God is humanity fully alive’ means we use our humanity to reflect our understanding of God.”
The keynote address was given by the inspiring Bishop Yvette Flunder, founder and minister to the City of Refuge UCC. Bishop Flunder’s address entitled “We Are the Light of Love in the World” was powerful-ranging from passionate to humorous with a genuine inclusiveness that was felt by the entire, diverse audience.
I invite you to view Bishop Flunder’s keynote address here in three parts. (Total viewing time is approximately 20 minutes). While the videography is not professional quality, the message is not diminished in the least:
On July 22nd, the height of summer in the Northern Hemisphere, fruits and vegetables ripening, sun baking or steaming, cool waters beckoning, warm nights full of stars and fireflies, when our senses are so engaged, the Roman Catholic, the Anglican, and Eastern Orthodox churches all celebrate The Feast of Saint Mary Magdalene. Or Magdalen, as some prefer. I know her as Maeve, the Celtic Mary Magdalen. This summer marks the twentieth anniversary of my first encounter with what might be described as an archetypal force, or, as one reader called her, an imaginary friend.
Mary being even more incarnate: Jules Joseph Lefebvre's 1876
It would have sufficed if there had been LGBT people in Colorado Springs, home of fervently anti-gay Focus on the Family and New Life Church.
It would have sufficed if there had been some LGBT organizations in the Springs – maybe a pride center, a gay men’s chorus, a bar or two.
It would have sufficed if there had been a single religious organization in the Springs – a church, a synagogue – that openly welcomed and supported LGBT people just as we are.
It would have sufficed if there had been a pride parade in the Springs some year or other.
It would have sufficed if a single church or synagogue had a contingent marching in the pride parade.
But now all these things have come to be, and many more. This past Sunday, the city known for years as the homophobic center of the “Hate State” (so called for once passing a statewide measure systematically denying LGBT rights) held its 20th annual Pride Parade and PrideFest. Ordained ministers from various denominations held a commitment ceremony for same-sex couples while hundreds of people wandered from booth to booth in the rain, buying rainbow gear and signing petitions.
Artist David Hewson, whose beautiful work has appeared in Tikkun on several occasions, has contacted us about an environmental and social crisis in Peru receiving little American media coverage. Hewson has spent the past two years living in Peru working with a shaman on a series of paintings surrounding the myths of indigenous groups in the Amazon. Through his residency in Peru, Hewson has witnessed some of the harm being done to the sacred jungle of the Amazon and its inhabitants. Peruvian President Alan Garcia and his government have alleviated many sanctions on gas and oil companies working in the Amazon. With increased access to previously protected areas, these companies have created dangerous health conditions for the indigenous groups of the Amazon, including high lead and cadmium levels found in their blood and river contamination. In 2009 many indigenous groups united to form a blockade and protest the government’s support of oil and gas companies in the Amazon. It resulted in violence, and between 30 and 100 deaths of indigenous people and police officers (photo).
Paul McAuley, a British, lay Catholic missionary who has lived in Peru for more than 20 years, has recently been ordered to leave. The Peruvian government is trying to expel him from the country on charges of risk to “the security of the state, public order and the national defense.” His deportation order is being appealed.
How embarrassing for America. For eight years their President was a kind of junior bully, a swaggering, bow-legged, sarcastic naïf, who made most of the country ashamed of their nationality. One apologized continuously for being that pariah in global culture — the American, the one with the drones and the barbed wire and the mines and the maimed children and the spy systems and the banks. One watched Europeans treat America as a Walmart nation, showing up for weekends with empty suitcases to buy the cheap goods, but with contempt as well as shame for its tawdry values, its greed, its mercenary and bullying ways, its sneakiness.
And then hope appeared. Just as in the cowboy stories and other American romances, a stranger came out of nowhere, a hero, someone who everyone believed could save the day. Pas si vite, mon vieux. As an American, one could hold one’s head up again with a deeply intelligent leader, who knew how to use our precious language, who could speak truth to power, someone who was also black, and therefore could redeem us, not just for eight years but for four hundred. Be still my beating heart, Americans thought throughout the campaign: Get out of his way, Hillary.
A manager in a failing department store runs to the bathroom and throws up, consumed with the fear of losing her health benefits which, even with COBRA, will cost too much.
A teacher wakes up multiple nights a week with his whole body clenched, dreading that California’s annual pink slip won’t be retracted this time.
A factory worker grieves the loss of friendship and socializing at work as much as the lost income.
Very likely everyone reading this knows someone who has recently lost a job. Unemployment is a strange word; defined negatively, it fails to convey the meaning of an often devastating experience (though one that, together, we can mitigate). In a society that has allowed many supportive institutions to atrophy, job loss looms even more menacingly than it would elsewhere. Added to the practical economic blows are wrenching emotional wounds: fear, self-blame, despair, and lowered self-esteem.
The late Cambridge University professor Marie Jahoda (a Jew and former prisoner of the Austrian Fascists) noted in an important 1982 article, that having a job “imposes a time structure on the waking day; it compels contacts and shared experiences with others outside the nuclear family; it demonstrates that there are goals and purposes which are beyond the scope of an individual but require a collectivity.” Unfortunately, for too many, work is the only significant collective activity they have outside the nuclear family.
Last Thursday July 15th Fran Luck interviewed Abby Scher and me about right-wing “feminism.” I wrote about it after our talk, and I just wanted you to know that you can hear us at http://archive.wbai.org. Just scroll down the page until you come to the “Joy of Resistance” on Thursday July 15 at 11:00am (the listing is in reverse chronological order). The first half of the show concerns current news about women around the world, and the interview begins at 31:17 (i.e. 31 minutes and 17 seconds into the program). Hope you enjoy it.
Christopher Hitchens’s book God is Not Great: How Religion Poisons Everything is a lengthy and detailed description of what happens when religious people behave badly. And this apparent correlation between religion and bad behavior is perhaps one of the most common reasons cited by the new atheists as to why all religion should be abandoned. But does Hitchens really believe religion causes people to do bad things? As I illustrate his position is unclear.
An interview with Jian Ghomeshi on QTV reveals the double standard that Hitchens has about the cause/effect relationship of religion and human behavior.
Jian Ghomeshi: I think you would be hard pressed to find a religious person to claim that there’s never been any negative implications or violence or wicked deeds that have been done in the name of religion.
Hitchens: They say in the name of. It’s not in the name of. That’s their get out clause. You echo it yourself. It’s explicit; it’s part of the religion. The most celebrated action of the Abrahamic is the willingness of someone to gut and murder his own son because he thinks it will please God…It’s not in the name of. It’s in the word of God himself. The commandments and instructions. These are warrants for genocide, rape, slavery, infant mutilation and worse.
Hitchens has also stated, “Religion kills,” “is violent” and “has caused innumerable people not just to conduct themselves no better than others, but to award themselves permission to behave in ways that would make a brothel-keeper or an ethnic cleanser raise an eyebrow.” He has also said, “The evil things missionaries do are definitely done because of religion.” Hitchens tries to draw a direct correlation between the violent behavior of people and their religion. His book God is Not Great is mostly a chronicle of all of the horrendous things done by people who are religious. And he disagrees with Ghomeshi who says wicked deeds have been done in the name of religion. But if something is not done in the name of religion how else does it occur? According to Hitchens religion has the magical power to make people do things. But for Hitchens religion only has the power to make people do wicked things. Anything good done in the name of religion is strictly due to human nature and nothing else, “Human decency is not derived from religion. It precedes it.” After discussing some awful acts carried out by people who are religious Hitchens states, “At minimum this makes it impossible to argue that religion causes people to behave in a more kindly or civilized matter.” But in the same interview on QTv he states [emphasis added],
Jian Ghomeshi: Would you agree that there is anything in the world that that has been done in the name of religion that is positive?
Hitchens: Things done by Jimmy Carter are done by Jimmy Carter. If you’re telling me people wouldn’t help build affordable housing if they weren’t Baptist fundamentalists…
Edwin Rutsch is videotaping all kinds of people in political hotspots and asking them for their views about and experience of empathy. Today he is at a pro-Johannes Mehserle demonstration in Walnut Creek, an outlying Bay Area suburb. Mehserle is the San Francisco Bay Area transit policeman who killed an innocent, unarmed traveler in full view of dozens of people last year, and who was just convicted of involuntary manslaughter. After the verdict was announced on July 8 a great deal of anger was expressed on the streets of Oakland at the insufficiency of the verdict, and Edwin was there taping as well (he recommends #s 27, 29 and 34 to our readers): here is # 27, his brief interview with our own Nichola Torbett:
In this video Niochola deftly brings together two strands of nonviolent work that can seem to be working at odds with each other.
Ads Appearing on Public Transportation in Major Cities
How would you react if you saw a sign like the one in this image on a bus you were about to board, but change a few words. “Facing Ex-Communication? Eternal damnation for your soul? Is your minister threatening you? Leaving Christianity?”
Many Muslims (and many folks like me) are rightfully upset by these ads that are appearing in various cities around the United States. Is this free speech? Is it hate speech?
In 2008, Julio Diaz retrieved his wallet from a mugger by taking the man to lunch. Meanwhile, a cat in the Amazon rainforest lures its prey by crying like a baby monkey.
Not long ago we celebrated thirty years of mixed marriage. Some people said it couldn’t last, and it’s true: we come from radically different cultures whose members have battled each other off and on since pre-history and still struggle today. But we persisted. We beat the odds. Statistics vary, but some sources say close to fifty percent of marriages like ours will fail. Yes, a marriage between one man and one woman, a mixed gender marriage, which proponents of California’s proposition 8, among others, insist is the only kind of marriage there is.
I am not only a thirty year veteran of a mixed gender marriage, my husband and I are also minority members in our immediate and extended family. When we gather for family celebrations, more than half the company is gay. When I consider my circle of friends and my wider community, the same is true. The difference in our minority status is that no one discriminates against us, passes moral judgment on us, or deprives us of our civil rights.
Having infuriated Democrats with her astonishing loss of Ted Kennedy’s long-held Senate seat to a suburban truck-drivin’ pin-up populist, Martha Coakley is back. But this time she’s racking up a series of impressive legal victories for liberals. She has won a $102 million dollar settlement against Morgan Stanley, taken on insurance companies for paying hospitals based on political clout rather than quality, and successfully challenged the constitutionality of the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA).
Athough unchallenged by the GOP in her November race for Attorney General, Coakley is campaigning vigorously. Could she be positioning herself to recapture the MA Senate seat from Scott Brown for the Dems? Is this the real Martha Coakley? Or both?
I recently attended a training session for adults who work with children in our faith community. The training included the signs people should look for that might indicate that a child has been abused. For example, a six year old boy who was always happy, outgoing, and loved playing outside with his friends, suddenly withdraws, only wants to stay in his room, doesn’t want to go to school… Could that be a sign of abuse? Yes. And in New Orleans the abuse he suffered at the hands of adults responsible for his care at school was MANDATED by the school.
