Dharma Forest

North American Interfaith Network Connect!

N.A.I.N., the North American Interfaith Network held its annual gathering at the University of San Francisco  from  July 24-28, 2008. I sang with my 12-string guitar to open the first morning session. The friendly relationship between the URI and NAIN is  example of Interfaith fellowship done in the spirit of harmony and collaboration. As I sang in the USF cafeteria at 8:30 AM, so many friendly URI faces came in, including the URI Founder, Bishop William Swing, URI former Chair Rita Semel, URI Executive Director Charles Gibbs, Core Staff Sally Mahe and Barbara Hartford, and many other Global Trustees, including my fellow North American colleagues, P.K.McCary and Adelia Sandoval.

Design and Process Science Conference in Taichung

In early June I traveled to Taichung to attend the annual Conference of the Society for Design & Process Science (SDPS). This year they met in Asia University, Taichung, Taiwan. I spoke about Buddhist views on being a "Transdiscipinarian," somebody who wears many different hats while integrating the effort in service to humanity. I introduced Master Hsuan Hua's legacies: establishing the Sangha in the West, Translating the Mahayana Sutras into the world's langauge, setting up schools in every monastery, and advocating interfaith harmony as an example of transdisciplinary pioneer vision. The Mahayana Bodhisattva has to expediently teach all living beings where they are, each according to their abiities to understand.

Gethsemani III Buddhist-Catholic Gathering

Monks and nuns, both Catholic and Buddhist, have always lived simply, and close to the natural world. Monastic communities East and West have served as stewards of the environment, rooted in place locally, since the Buddhist monastics put down roots in India and the Desert Fathers (and Mothers) went to ground in North Africa and the Mediterranean countries.

Catching Up On Summer

This summer I attended conferences: Gethsemane III in Trappist, Kentucky; the SDPS Transdisciplinary Conference On Integrated Systems, Design and Process Science in Taichung, Taiwan; the North American Interfaith Network's Gathering in San Francisco; the American Hymn Society in Berkeley, the North American Monastic Sangha Gathering in Mt. Shasta, California, the Buddhist Music Festival in Long Beach, and the Swannanoa  Gathering in Warren Wilson College, North Carolina. In the articles to come I'll be posting photos and details.

Autumn is here and the Berkeley Monastery is back to school!
(Photo caption: The Ashtronauts, otherwise known as Ashely Broder's Intermediate Mandolin class from Swannanoa's Guitar Week).

"Dedication of Merit"

"Dedication of Merit," filmed last year at the 5th Global Sangha Conference in Kulala Lumpur, Malaysia. The melody is Loreena McKennitt's "Dark Night of the Soul."

"Repentance Verse" on YouTube

"Repentance Verse," filmed at the Fifth Global Sangha Conference in Kuala Lumpur, last year. The melody is Gordon Lightfoot's "Early Morning Rain."

"American Beef Cow" on YouTube

Hi,

Did you all know I've got three songs up on YouTube? The videos were taken last year at the 5th Global Sangha Conference in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. Enjoy!

This Essay Will Catch Your Attention

Here's a statement on the Environmental Crisis that caught my attention. It's hard to misinterpret the meaning of Bill McKibben's prose. And he is quoting the chief scientist at NASA, a man whose knowledge of the weather and the planet must work, or else astronauts would die and the space program would fail. If we don't take this man's word as valid, who knows more than he? I read this article and I'm convinced.

Civilization's last chance; The planet is nearing a tipping point on climate change, and it gets much worse, fast.
By Bill McKibben, May 11, 2008

Even for Americans -- who are constitutionally convinced that there will always be a second act, and a third, and a do-over after that, and, if necessary, a little public repentance and forgiveness and a Brand New Start -- even for us, the world looks a little terminal right now.

Essay #4 The Luger and the Ukulele

This is the next installment of writing assignments I did for Jon Carroll's class back in 2001. A luger is a German handgun, a ukulele is a small wooden instrument with four nylon strings.

The Luger and the Ukulele
Monday, December 3, 2001
Rev. Heng Sure

More Sangha Guests!

Our Sangha neighbors from Abhayagiri Forest Monastery come down to stay at BBM the first Tuesday of each month. We have kept this relationship alive for a decade or more, and it is a high point of every month. This time Ajahn Pasanno brought four other monks with him to speak Dharma and then drive to Fremont to pay respects to a Thai Elder who was visiting the US. Here is a photo of the group in the dining room at Berkeley. Their Dharma Protector Debbie drove the monks down from Redwood Valley.

Many Buddha's Birthday Celebrations

At this time of the year the Buddhist world celebrates the birthday of our founder, the Prince Siddhartha Gautama, who became Shakyamuni Buddha. The dates are uncertains and the calendars are various, so any Spring we might attend five or six different Buddha's birthday celebrations. Last Sunday I went to the Buddhist Council of Northern California's Buddha's birthday in Berkeley. Nine traditions sent Sangha members, 150 people attended and a good time was had by all.

My old friend Bhante Assaji, from India, appeared by surprise. When we knew each other in 1983 he was a young monk with a reputation as somebody who would float on boats to rescue people stranded by floods in the lowlands.

He has since become the Chief Priest in all of India, quite a distinction. It was  great meeting him again!

Guests at the Berkeley Monastery

April and May brought guests. Rev. Bill Lesher, Chairman of the Board of the Council for the Parliament of the Worlds' Religions came over on Saturday to talk to a dozen Buddhist friends, including the Venerable Ajahn Mahinda, from Australia. The Parliament will convene in 2009 in Melbourne, Australia, and Ven. Mahinda and I proposed ways that the Buddhists might organize and form a united presence at the Parliament.

Essay #3 Historical Witness

Please enjoy the next installment of my essays written during Jon Carrol's writing workshop eight years back. This exercise was called: "Historical Witness. Pick a time and place and write as if you were there."

So of course I chose:

At the Buddha’s Side Beneath the Bodhi Tree

Design a Fantasy Auto (Writing Assignment #2)

Writing Assignment #2 from my class with Jon Carroll: "Design a Fantasy Auto." In this essay I imagined the what would the marketplace look like if advertising and design targeted religions directly. Salesman Peter Noster of Holy Spirit Motors tries to snow Fr. O'Neill with the Pontiff model and then works his way down the model line to the Eremite. Not everybody will get the humor and it certainly is aimed at Roman Catholics with affection, not with malice or sarcasm.

Enjoy!

A New Series: Heng Sure's Writing!

Since I began my writing retreat I dug around in my writing folder and found some short essays from years past. These pieces were assignments in my Jon Carroll writing class. Jon is the beloved Personal Essay columnist from the SF Chronicle.

I plan to periodically post some of the better pieces for your reading enjoyment. Do enjoy!

The first one is called "Dragon Racing In Alberta." (a true story, mostly).

Writing Retreat Happening!

It's actually happening, words on paper. Appreciate the support from friends and well-wishers. Visited my mom and sister for three days and came back with some family pictures. Romantic Canadian war hero father and glamorous intrepid aircraft communicator mother. Sister Liz in New York and Clowery siblings in Maryland.

First, my mom. More photos after the jump.

Buddhist Youth Spring Conference #10!

Dharma Realm Buddhist Young Adults, formerly known as DRBY, is holding its tenth annual spring conference "Insight and Happiness on the Buddhist Path" here at the Monastery this weekend, Saturday and Sunday, March 28-29th, 2008. These events are tremendously inspiring, as the energy and enthusiasm of young minds meets the principles of Master Hsuan Hua's Dharma teachings in the West. It's a time for making friends, hanging out with the Sangha, and getting inspired by people who enjoy sharing their experiences on the Buddhist Path.

You need to regster to attend, and now is the time. Go to the website of DRBY and follow the links to register.

VegFest in Ukiah!

Vegetarian/Vegan Activism Comes to Ukiah, California on Sunday, March 16th, 2008, from 11:00 to 4:00 PM.
Following the slogan, "Stop Global Warming One Bite at a Time," the event convenes at Ukiah's Saturday Afternoon Club, 107 South Oak St.

Featured speakers include myself, singing vegetarian inspired songs accompanied by a 12-string guitar, and also Howard Lyman, the well-known "Mad Cowboy." Howard is a passionate, committed advocate for plant-based eating and environmental activism. He calls himself "a former cattle rancher who won't eat meat."

Howard Lyman's website

***Writing Retreat In Progress***

Stop all the busy-ness, I'm concentrating! That is to say, I've begun a three month writing retreat, to write a book I'm supposed to write. I plan to take three months off from my daily rounds as pastor of the Berkeley Buddhist Monastery and focus on one activity: saying in words what I want to say about Buddhist practice. I'm going to forgo meetings, lectures and consultations in order to give birth to a book about Buddhist practice. People I meet when I travel to Buddhist countries East and West ask me all the time, "What is the best practice for me? What should I do to move forward in my spiritual practice?"

A New Year Coming On: Same Old or Renewal?

Looking back on a travelin' year, today, at the change of the calendar. New music CD, and new story-telling CD, (type Heng Sure into the Apple iTunes store search window) travels to nine countries and nearly 200 Dharma talks or Sutra lectures, classes or music performances. This is of course, what monks do, especially if you're a disciple of the late Master Hsuan Hua. You do that as long as possible without burning out and then you balance it with stillness. So I'm heading for a period of stillness, I plan a reteat to write a book, from February til April, if I can. More on that later.

Until then, Happy New Year, may 2008 bring you all the happiness you seek. Together let's wish that all beings quickly realize the fruition of all their good karma and all their negativity vanish like ice melting in the warm Spring breeze.

Meeting with Imee Ooi

For the last five years wherever I go around the Buddhist world I've been hearing certain contemporary Buddhist music that catches my attention. In almost every case the music comes from Imee Ooi, a Malaysian Buddhist composer from Kuala Lumpur. Her name in Chinese is Huang Huiyin (黃慧音）which means "Wisdom Sound." This trip to Malaysia I asked my hosts in KL if

(Photo Caption: Choi Yu, Rev. Heng Sure, Imee Ooi, Yvette Kang) there was any chance to meet with Imee and it happened. I spoke with her for three hours on Sunday evening, before my return to the US and I learned more about her music.

Imee takes chants, sutras, mantras and sacred names and sets them into melodies that she composes. The composing, arranging and performing are all done by her, including multi-track vocals. The result sounds ethereal and tranquil, but not syrupy or boring. Her melodies are fresh and moving.

5th Global Conference on Buddhism

Just back from Kuala Lumpur and the 5th Global Conference on Buddhism. The panel of speakers was inspiring, including Ajahn Brahm from Australia, Thubten Jinpa, (translator for HH the Dalai Lama) from Montreal, Roshi Jan Chozen Bays, from Oregon, among others. I gave two talks and gave a mini-concert (four songs) after lunch on Saturday. Judging by the number of voices singing along, the response was satisfying. 900 Malaysian Buddhists attended, the majority being English-speaking Chinese Malaysians.

Paramita CD now available on iTunes!

As of today, Tuesday, Nov. 27, 2006, my Paramita: American Buddhist Folk Songs CD is available for download on iTunes! Should you want to surf on over, first download and install iTunes on your computer, it's a free download from Apple.com, then click on the iTunes store. Once it opens, type "Heng Sure" into the search window and up will come the songs. Here is a link that will take you there directly, if you have the software on your machine.

If you want to buy the actual CD package, you can find it at CDBaby, by clicking on this link.

Meeting with Dr. A.T. Ariyaratne

On Friday, thanks to Nipun Mehta, I had a chance to speak with Dr. A. T. Ariyaratne, a Gandhi International Peace Prize winner who has dedicated his life to the non-violent transformation of societies, starting with his war-torn nation of Sri Lanka. Dr. Ariyaratne is truly a heroic man, cut from the same cloth as Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela and Dr. M.L. King Jr.

A Buddhist, and humble to the core, he is a living legend, and the stories and statistics about his life stagger the imagination. For example, through his efforts, 15, 000 villages in Sri Lanka became economically self-sufficient, 11 million (that's correct) people, nearly half the population of Sri Lanka, have recevied benefits from Sarvodaya, his organization, either through education, through elimination of poverty, or through participating in his meditation programs, that have brought up to 850,000 people into meditation at the same time. Please find out more about Sarvodaya here.

Visit to Harbin

Our China Delegation traveled to Harbin's Ji Le Si (Utmost Happiness Monastery) to pay a visit to Master Jing Bo and to pay our respects to the closest large city to Master Hsuan Hua's birthplace. Please see photos of our visit below. Without any advertising, 2,000 people came out to have a look at Master Hsuan Hua's American disciples. Master Hua is known far and wide as "the Noble Monk Who Went to America, (Lu Mei Gao Seng).

Visit with Uncle Earl

One of America's finest Bluegrass/Old Time/Traditional music bands, Uncle Earl, visited the Berkeley Monastery on Wednesday. I've known of Abigail Washburn's Chinese language and banjo playin' skills for years and when her all-girl (all g'earl) bluegrass group played Freight & Salvage this week we finally met face to face. Abbey's bandmates are happy souls and gracious women who brought happy energy in abundance. Please check out the Uncle Earl website.

Beginnings of Western Buddhist Culture

Buddhism has been in the US for 100 years now and the first glimmers of authentically Western Buddhist culture have emerged, first in California ('natch) but elsewhere as well. I will be speaking at the Fremont, Ca central library in three weeks about four aspects of Western Buddhist culture that we can already identify. I predict that 1) equal access to the Dharma (democracy), 2) psychological understanding of the Dharma, 3) scientific approach to cultivation, and 4) animating of the interface between humanity and the natural world will result from Buddhism's impact on Western culture.

Basics of Buddhism: Buddhism 102

The Basics of the Buddha's Teachings: Buddhism 102!  Coming up for the next four Saturday evenings! Following the responses to our Spring course Buddhism 101, starting this Saturday evening at 7:30 we are continuing with Buddhism 102, four courses titled: "Where To Now? Buddhism's Roadmap to Awakening!"
We will focus on the end of the Buddhist spiritual path: 1) the Bodhi Resolve and the Dao; 2) Arhats; 3) Bodhisattvas; and 4) Buddhas.

The course is free of charge, and will also be webcast. Follow this link to www.berkeleymonastery.org for details.

Please register - - it's easy and it helps us keep track of students; further we can get materials to you and notify you of any changes. Registration is done at the same website: www.berkeleymonastery.org. Thanks!
 

Enthusiastic Welcome at Da Pu Ti Monastery

When the delegation arrived at Great Bodhi Monastery (Da Puti Si), out in the cornfields of Jixian County, in far northeastern Heilongjiang, Manchuria, we were greeted with an enthusiastic welcome that included flower bouquets, a red carpet, and a brass band playing "Amitabha." Abbot Master Zhengxiu traveled last year to meet us in Beijing and invite our delegation to visit his monastery and this year the conditions came together. The experience was truly heart-warming, as the Manchurian Buddhist community went all out to make us feel welcome and appreciated. More photos to follow.

Article in the Kuala Lumpur Star Online

Today's online edition of The Star, from Kuala Lumpur, features a story on me written by Catherin Siow. I will attend a Global Sangha Conference in November in KL, and this article serves as a preview for the conference.

Read the story here.

Tea City Parking Pot!

Visited "Tea City" in Beijing - - a four story shopping center dedicated to Chinese tea and the experience of tea drinking. In the Xuanwu District of Beijing there are perhaps three thousand tea merchants, all gathered around a few streets, and some in the multi-story malls like Tea City.

The shop we visited included a landscaped tea pot and cup made of shrubs, located in the parking lot, which every two minutes, emitted a stream of boiling tea! (Water, actually). It was a downtown parking pot!

We had come for a taste of Da Hong Pao "Big Red Robe" tea, a variety of Wulong (Black Dragon) tea. Delicious! Click through for a picture of the real stuff!

Ming Emperor's Buddhist Songs

Visited Master Yuanchi at Fayuan Monastery. Master Yuanchi is a respected monk in Bejing, and serves as the librarian for the Buddhist Association of China. He has discovered the one and only set of Buddhist songs written by Ming Emperor Yong Le. Apparently the Yong Le Emperor penned thousands of lyrics, perhaps numbering 5 - 6,000 in all, to be sung to the ancient tunes of Chinese Tsz, (Ci) the sonnnet-like poetry form. For  millenia, poets and literary people have sung poems to these melodies. The  Emperor set  the names of Buddhas and Bodhisattvas to Tsz melodies.

1,000 Year-old Sharira Pagoda

We traveled to Xi'an, China at the invitation of Mr. Shi Yuan-peng of the Cultural and Religious Publishers of the Central Government. Our destination was to inspect cultural marvel; a late Tang, early Song (11th century) sharira (relics) pagoda. The existence of this marvelous item is known to very few; news of its discovery will be released next month. The pagoda has five layers, an outer stone shell, then successive pagodas of iron, bronze, silver and gold. Arrayed in layers like Russian dolls, the layers lead to the walnut sized gold pagoda which houses an unknown treasure, predicted by the world’s experts to be multiple sharira, or relics of Shakyamuni Buddha.

Delegation to China

I'm in Beijing, China, heading for Harbin, Manchuria with a delegation of Dharma-friends. Our purpose in coming is to speak Dharma for a group of young monks in Manchuria. Because both Bhikshu Heng Lai and I have been ordained for 31 years we're considered  "Elders" in the Chinese Buddhist world. The Cultural Revolution nearly wiped out two generations of Chinese monks. Currently across China there are approximately twenty surviving monks who are 80+ years old; everybody else in the Sangha is under 40 years of age, and ten years in robes, at the most. When Heng Lai and I show up with three decades as a Sangha member, we are called "zhanglao" or "Elder," which title I find unfamilliar.

Interreligious Music & Art Festival

The IWR (Institute For World Religions) convened our first annual Interreligious Music and Arts Festival at the Monastery two Saturdays ago and by all accounts from the 200 or so attendees, it was a hit. I'll post more later, and I recommend clicking on this link for some outstanding photos of the event taken by Ching images. Musicians from eight religions and sixteen graphic artists from a variety of religions showed their creativity and a good time was had by all. Teance Fine Teas brewed and poured the refreshments.

Chinese TV Interview with Jay Stone Shih

Mr. Jay Stone Shih, host of Dialogue 360, a Bay Area Chinese language talk show, cable channel 32, (KMPT) invited me on two weeks ago and the show has been posted on line. It aired in two 30-minute segments and if you enjoy Chinese language interviews, check it out. I've appeared on Jay Stone's show twice before, when he hosted China Crosstalk, on Channel 26 (KTSF.) Everybody in the Bay Area knew Stone's show - - his 11:00 PM program earned him the title, the "Chinese Larry King Live." Issues of creativity lead him to go independent, and now he produces and publishes his own show on cable and online. We talked about the Paramita music CD and how Buddhism is coming to the West.

You can watch the shows online at this link. Scroll down to 9/13 and 9/17 listing and click the "Watch Video" link.

My Interview in "Kungfu Magazine"

Mr. Gene Ching, Associate Publisher of Kungfu Magazine called up last June and asked whether I knew anything about the Late Master Hai Deng's visit to the USA in the 1980s. I answered that both I and Dr. Martin Verhoeven were there for Master Hai Deng's entire visit to the Bay Area. Gene came up and drank tea and listened to our account of Hai Deng's meeting with Master Hsuan Hua, his trip to CTTB, his movie screening, and the  lessons in shaolin exercise, and in being a Buddhist monastic we got from from the elder martial artist Bhikshu. Gene published the interview in the latest issue (Nov.- Dec. 2007) of the magazine. His report is accurate and well-written. The story runs from pp 16-20 and continues on p. 58. You can find more information online.

My Article in Donald Mitchell's "Introducing the Buddhist Experience" (2nd Edition

Autumn has come and with it, I'm teaching another GTU class on Buddhist-Christian Dialogue. Our text book is the new edition of Donald Mitchell's Buddhism: Introducing the Buddhist Experience. This is the second edition and Don invited me to write about my experience as an American monk in the Chinese Mahayana tradition. My article appears on pages 392-398. Donald Mitchell is a professor at Purdue University, and a life-long Catholic, but his interest in Buddhist practice runs deep.
You'll find the book online.

Vietnamese Dharma-Friends in Europe

From Germany, to Poland, from France to Italy, from Finland to the USA our Dharma tour met Vietnamese Buddhist friends all over Europe. Our Assembly in Paris at the Chinagora Hotel gathered in over 600 people to bow, recite, take Refuge and Precepts, listen to lectures, and enjoy vegetarian meals. Because we brought our most experienced Vietnamese translator, Mr. Ha Guo - hong,  so my words and the talks given by the nuns in our delegation, were available via headphones to all Vietnamese speakers who required them.

Traveling to Poland

Riding a thirty-year old Russian train, covered in Cyrillic writing; it felt as though we had stepped back into the third world. It was midnight in Hannover; we were nineteen people, and our thirty bags. Crashed onto the train while the whistle blowed three times, impatiently.

More Thoughts From The Conference

Millions of Buddhist women have full ordination denied them by Buddhist men. This is not what the Buddha taught, rather it is half of the population discriminating against the other half. It is in the interest of Buddhist men to reinstate full human and religious rights to women. This is not only justice it is common sense.

The nature of consciousness is not gendered.

Suppose women woke up and took it into their own hands to educate themselves to the conditioning of the entertainment, cosmetic and fashion industries? Suppose women woke up and rejected the images that make them objects of men's desires?  How quickly would bulimia and anorexia eating disorders be forgotten?

Suppose women woke up and rejected the complicity that makes them passive victims of men's lust for warfare? How quickly could wars stop?

Thoughts From Hamburg Conference

From the road today heading Southeast to Milan and Verona. A turning point in the Hamburg Conference discussion was the evening  Q & A when the young Tibetan nuns were invited to share their opinions about the topics of the conference. One young person, Ani Choying Drolma, who is also known as "the Singing Nun", spoke first. She speaks English like a Californian and is both muscially gifted and courageous in singing sacred songs to support her monastery back in Nepal. Following her lead, half a dozen young TIbetan women spoke. Two themes emerged: 1) they were unaware of the issues surrounding being a Bhikshuni. Tibet has lost the lineage for centuries and the Buddhist men had never explained its advantages.

2) The young nuns resonated with the Mahayana's Bodhisattva vision. They said, "We want to rescue all living beings and benefit them with the Dharma." The Mahayana's Bodhisattva Path lies at the heart of these nuns resolve to cultivate.

"This is not a gender issue for us; we're Buddhists!" they emphasized.

Spent the Day At the Louvre with 18 Teenagers

And lived to tell the story What a fun day in Paris!

Report to the International Buddhist Women's Congress in Hamburg

I traveled with a delegation from DRBA of ten nuns and one other monk to Hamburg, Germany, for the First International Congress on Buddhist Women's Role in the Sangha, Bhikshuni Vinaya and Ordination Lineages.

The following is close to what I said to begin our report on, July 19th, 2007.

"The late Chan Master Hsuan Hua's legacy includes 31 centers around the world, 21 of which are staffed by women. Among the several hundred monastics ordained by Master Hua through the years in the USA, women outnumber men four to one. This Buddhist pioneer in the West has an extraordinary resonance with women religious worldwide.

On the Road In the Air

Guo Ji, Guo Cuc and Master Jin Rou, from Gold Coast, left Sydney heading for Hamburg, and that means 22 and 3/4 hours in the air to London, and then an hour and a half to Hamburg after meeting a flight in London's Heathrow airport. Our Qantas jet refueled in Singapore but had to wait on the tarmac for two hours and then pick a new route. It seems that if you miss a slot in the highways in the air another scheduled flight will bump you and the airline has to find another slot to book. We had to take on more fuel because we had to fly farther in another sky-route.

So with the two hour delay in Singapore, the layover in Heathrow and such we were in transit for 26 hours before arriving in Hamburg.

Connections with Buddhist Youth in Sydney

Immodest to post praises, I know, but I wanted to share some of the heart-felt comments and responses from my talk and songs in Sydney at the Mitra Conference:

"...I just wanted to express my sincere thanks for the dhamma and wisdom that you shared at the council and the conference.  I was moved to tears more than once, and it feels like my faith in the three jewels has grown, which has given me a lot of energy to make a greater effort with my practice and work for the dhamma." KW - Sydney

Dharma Events in Sydney

In Sydney for the weekend, with two events coming up. The first is a talk to the Buddhist Council of New South Wales, tonight (Friday, July 13th!) and then tomorrow and for the weekend, I'm speaking at the Mitra Buddhist Youth gathering: "Change Your Mind, Change the World," a sentiment I heartily endorse.

Australian Rainforest Critters

Kuranda Rainforest Jaunt! High up in Northern Queensland. Some of the faces, fur and feathers, not to mention a crocodile.
More pictures after the jump. Who doesn't love sleeping koalas, especially the last guy. (click the link).

Travel Journal: Stories Around the Globe

Going to keep a journal for my journey from San Francisco to Australia, to Germany, Poland, France, Italy and Finland. On the road, personal stories, with all the gripes and inspirations intact.

Started out with Tru Chung and Cuc Chung, in Dr. Mike Chung's big SUV. Left my jacket at the monastery; Sandy called as we reached Ashby Avenue. We had to circle back through Saturday traffic to pick it up. Good thing, too, Australia is cold in the winter!

Evening flight to Sydney. Australia immigration lost my visa. Then they found TWO visas for me. Retrograde Mercury?

"Thank you for helping to keep our airport secure. We are currently at security threat level one (orange?). Keep in contact with your bags at all times. Unaccompanied baggage will be destroyed." Why don't other nation's airports terrorize their citizens this way?

At baggage inspection my robe was flagged by a nervous, new inspector. The inspector apologized for giving me the pat down. 

United Religions Meeting in Antwerp

Been to Antwerp, Belgium for the URI Global Council (Board Meeting)

PK McCary, (A Lutheran from Texas,) Steven Fuqua (a Bahai from Minnesota, typing,) Tru Chung, (a Buddhist from Vietnam, standing), Rev. Heng Sure, Kathy Sandoval, a Native American from Orange County, Sheikh Bashir Dultz, and Raschid Bochmeuhl, two Muslims from Germany. The faces of URI.

City Square, Antwerp. Can you find the monk? (picture of Global Council after the jump!)