This podcast is offered by the San Francisco Zen Center on the web at www.sfcc.org. Our public programs are made possible by donations from people like you. Good morning, everyone. I sort of imagined there'd be about 10 of you. I got really nervous when I opened the door. But then I was also really happy that in this crazy world, case you hadn't noticed people are coming to the Dharma and finding Sangha and practicing and hi everyone online in that little box it's an imminently sane thing to do most of you don't know me I thought I'd just say briefly Chris Fortin

[01:00]

I lived here at Green Gulch for about 10 years in the 70s and 80s. I was married in this room. My son, our son, was born over next to the office. There was Brother David Steindl Ross urging there was a Buddhist Christian baptism in this very Zendo that had never happened before, and I don't think it's ever happened since. Amen. It was great, though. I was co-head of the garden with Wendy, amongst other things. So Green Gulch always feels like home. My feet know the grooves, the floor. George Wheelwright, who was still around back then, And it's so sweet to see so many of you who were young and looked like us back then, that this just continues and will continue.

[02:07]

Because that's the Buddha way. And we each have to find out what this means in our own hearts and bodies. And then how do we live it? And how do we help each other live it? So what I want to do today is offer some encouragements, be some stories. I have a lot of them, so rather than talk fast, I'll just offer what I can, and I'm watching my little clock. So I thought I'd start. First of all, I know Zenju is here as a guest teacher. And one of the things... Oh, I... I practice some with San Francisco Zen Center. I'm a senior teacher at Everyday Zen, and I lead a sangha in Sonoma County, Dharma Heart Zen. One of the things I do as a teacher, or actually I don't call myself a teacher in this instance, I'm just one of the, all of us trying to find our way, is I've offered for about 10 years something called the Racial and Social Justices Dharma Practice Group.

[03:18]

It's very clear it's as Dharma practice. There's a million different ways to do these things in the world, you know. But how do we do it as Dharma practice? And one of the ways we start each time is with a prayer by Zenju, Earthling Manuel, which I thought I would just offer to help us ground together. It's influenced by the Metta Sutta, the Loving Kindness Sutra. May all beings be cared for and loved. Be listened to, understood and acknowledged despite different views. Be accepted for who they are in this moment. Be afforded patience. Be allowed to live without fear of having their lives taken away or their bodies violated. May all beings be well in its broadest sense.

[04:24]

Be fed. Be clothed. Be treated as if their life is precious. Be held in the eyes of each other as family. May all beings be appreciated. Feel welcomed anywhere on the planet. Be freed from acts of hatred and desperation, including war, poverty, slavery, and street crimes. Live on the planet housed and protected from harm. Be given what is needed to live fully without scarcity, to enjoy life living without fear of one another. Be able to speak freely in a voice and mind of undeniable love. May all beings be awake. I flew home about a week and a half ago, mostly over jet lag, from travels in Vietnam.

[05:37]

And one of the things my husband and I do, Bruce also lived here, practiced here, practices continues to. We turn these questions together as we visited Thich Nhat Hanh's monastery in Hawaii, Vietnam. Thich Nhat Hanh During the time that I was here, Richard Baker and Thich Nhat Hanh really came together. Richard Baker, this is what he said about Thich Nhat Hanh. It's a cross between a cloud, a snail, and a piece of heavy machinery, a true religious presence. I remember sitting Tassajara in a practice period back in the days when study hallways still did it by kerosene lamp and Thich Nhat Hanh's words and books beginning to filter down for the first time.

[06:44]

And I was so happy that somebody was saying, how do we do this? Buddhist practice with its ancient history of monasticism, how do we do this in the world? And that he brought forward engaged Buddhism. It remains a koan for me, and I think for many of us. One of the things I didn't realize, his monastery is in Hue, which is right on the... Maybe some of you know this. I'll just... Between what was then North and South Vietnam and Hue saw some of the worst fighting of the war. There were long urban battles where North Vietnamese and Viet Cong forces fought U.S. and South Vietnamese troops for control of this ancient...

[07:47]

It was one of the war's longest and bloodiest battles, resulting in thousands of civilians, significant military casualties with estimates of death ranging in the thousands, and dozens of mass graves were discovered. Over 80% of the structures in the city were destroyed. I just didn't know the hell realms that Thich Nhat Hanh personally. experienced and the people who are practicing with him and where his teachings came from. I find it deeply trustworthy. I feel that way with the Dalai Lama too. You know, these teachings are coming out of people who have walked through very difficult times. And we're in difficult times, but we're not, we're sliding, but we haven't slid off the edge yet. So please, that's why I want to offer this because it's up to each one of us

[08:47]

This is from the Plung Village website. When war came to Vietnam, monks and nuns were confronted with the question of whether to adhere to the contemplative life and stay meditating in the monasteries or to help those around them suffering under the bombings and the turmoil of war. Thich Nhat Hanh was one of those who chose to do both and in doing so founded the Engaged Buddhism Movement. Profound gratitude. Thank you. So he co-founded the School of Youth for Social Service. They went out in the midst of the war, young people, and provided humanitarian aid and rebuilt war-torn villages, established schools and health centers during the war and after. What I want to spend a little bit of time today before I jump into other things, because all these things I want to tell you about, these turnings. Because maybe you, like me, are asking, it's a koan of the time.

[09:54]

How do we practice? What are we doing this time? What is it to be a true and deep-hearted practitioner in the midst of? I'll just diverge for a minute. I was so happy to come home from Vietnam. I was so happy to come home because it felt like I was coming to home to our mess. There's messes all over the world, but somehow this is our particular karmic cultural mess. So there's some way that we each, I think joyfully, and of course with lots of other feelings, can meet this moment. So Thich Nhat Hanh formed the order of interbeing. And what's really important, I think, one of them, is that it was both monastics and laypeople from the beginning. He was really, really clear that he wasn't going to do this traditional division between priests and monastics and monks and nuns, and they all practiced together.

[11:04]

I wrote down this description of what they did because I thought it was kind of, I mean, it wasn't just like easy stuff. They organized demonstrations. They printed books and leaflets, ran social service projects, organized an underground network to help draft resistors. They helped war victims. They really engaged in the world. And they renewed themselves with a day of mindfulness each weekend where they sat and they walked and they recited the 14 mindfulness trainings, which is in Thich Nhat Hanh's wonderful little book called Interbeing. And they recited the Heart Sutra, just like us. I'm not going to say this correctly, so anyone who knows Vietnamese, I already apologize. But the Vietnamese order of interbeing is called Thiep Hen order.

[12:09]

And I was, because maybe some of you know the Avatamsaka Sutra. which is kind of extravagant and wondrous and mind-blowing and time and timeless. And it's based on the Avatamsaka Sutra. So he didn't just make this up out of nowhere. He based it on the deepest, earliest beginnings of Buddhism. So here's what the... If you take those two words apart, here are the meanings. And I found this in the Interbeing book. You could look it up, too. Ischiep means to receive. To receive goodness, beauty, insight, and the teachings. I'll remind you, this is in the midst of a horrible war. Two, to bring Buddha's enlightenment into this moment. If we don't enact it in our own lives and our own hearts, it's just dead words. This is continuous practice. Three, to be in touch with the present moment, the beauty and the wonder and the fear, anxiety, hunger, disease, oppression.

[13:17]

Once we have truly understood the suffering, we will know what to do to transform it as well as what we should not do. Kian, the second word, means the present moment is life itself. There is no way to enlightenment. Enlightenment is the way. There is no liberation. Liberation is the way. Two, we have to touch reality deeply and experience the wonders of reality. It is the Dharma door of living peacefully and joyfully every moment. I got here early and took a walk down through it. through the fields. Just let life in. All of it. It is rather wondrous, this birth, death, life.

[14:24]

All of it. And the suffering. Three, we need to make our objectives become real. Ideas about understanding and compassion are not enough. It must become real in our lives. Without a calm, peaceful mind, our actions will only create more trouble and destruction in the world. And I'll just say, probably say again, a calm, peaceful mind is not a permanent state of mind. This is practice. I'm not denying that I'm tossed around all the time, and I would guess you are too. But I know what my ground is. I know what my intention is. Four, we need to adapt the teachings to modern needs. This means the Dharma we practice and teach has to be appropriate for the intended audience, for this time, for all of you, for us in America.

[15:29]

Amazing he came here. and changed Western Buddhism. And we continue. It has to be appropriate for the times we're living in. Okay, so now I'm going to talk about Alan Sanaki, Huzan Alan Sanaki, abbot of the Berkeley Zen Center who died in the last year, who I really miss as a beacon, as someone who devoted himself to engaged Buddhism. I found a Lion's Roar article from 2020 where he talked about, Alan did, Thich Nhat Hanh's profound contributions to Buddhism, activism, and the place where they meet. And the place where they meet. At the heart of Thich Nhat Hanh's teachings was the centrality of mindfulness as the core of Buddhist practice. So first...

[16:30]

Alan gives something from Thich Nhat Hanh's book, Pieces Every Step. Mindfulness must be engaged. Once there is seeing, there must be acting. Otherwise, what is the use of seeing? We must be aware of the real problems of the world. Then with mindfulness, we will know what to do and what not to do to be of help. you planting seeds of joy and peace I'll try to do that with every step peace is every step shall we continue the journey so here's a story by Alan that I found really encouraging because I think I do maybe you do we tend to project on teachers and think teachers have it all together Or certainly, they have it more together than we do. And maybe they do in these moments. But I think it's way more important, personally, to say, I'm a human being.

[17:35]

And so are you. And we're all waking up together. And how can we help each other? So Alan tells this story that he was a director of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship all through the 1990s. And he was asked by Tai and his growing community to organize biannual talks at a Berkeley theater that there were 4,000 people coming. You're nodding. You know some of this. The first talk Alan organized was in April 1991 in the immediate aftermath of Desert Storm, the first U.S. war against Saddam Hussein's Iraq following its invasion of Kuwait and the police beating of African-American Rodney King in Los Angeles. Of course, we know this has gone on and on. This is just one snapshot, but I find it really helpful what Alan shares about Thich Nhat Hanh. Alan says, I was struck by Tai's comments that night.

[18:35]

He spoke of his deep anger over the war in Kuwait and the beating of King, both of which seemed to trigger for him painful memories of the war in Vietnam and the brutal ignorance of U.S. oppression. Thich Nhat Hanh was angry. He said he had considered canceling his tour. With all its retreats and Dharma events, Allen says Thich Nhat Hanh's words revealed to me that he wasn't an unreachable saint, but a man, a person with raw feelings. And then he shared that he'd meditated on his own reactivity. Anybody meditating on your own reactivity these days? And realized that he had to continue his tour as planned because these oppressors and victims, the police, Rodney King, U.S.

[19:39]

soldiers, Iraqis, and all their government leaders were neither different nor distant from himself. That same week in the New York Times op-ed, Thich Nhat Hanh wrote, looking more deeply, I was able to see that the policemen who were beating Rodney King were also myself. Why were they doing that? Because our society is full of hatred and violence. Everything is like a bomb ready to explode, and we are part of that bomb. We are co-responsible for that bomb. That is why I saw myself in the policeman beating the driver. We are all these policemen. Alan closed his essay by saying, let us strive to be like Ty, that is, let us strive to be truly human, our true selves. Let us strive to be truly human, our true selves.

[20:44]

So this took me back to Thich Nhat Hanh's Call Me By My True Names. Most of you probably know it, but you haven't looked at it for a long time, or maybe I'll just bring it forward. It was of many things he wrote. It was the one that penetrated, I think, for many of us. Look deeply. Every second I am arriving to be a bud on a spring branch, to be a tiny bird with still fragile wings. learning to sing in my new nest, to be a caterpillar in the heart of a flower, to be a jewel hiding itself in a stone. I still arrive in order to laugh and to cry, to fear and to hope. The rhythm of my heart is the birth and death of all that is alive. I am the mayfly metamorphosing, on the surface of the river, and I am the bird that swoops down to swallow the mayfly.

[21:56]

I am the frog swimming happily in the clear water of a pond, and I am the grass snake that silently feeds itself on the frog. I am the child in Uganda, all skin and bones, my legs as thin as bamboo sticks, and I am the arms merchant selling deadly weapons to Uganda. I am the 12-year-old girl refugee on a small boat, When we were in Vietnam, we actually took a boat out on the rivers where a lot of the refugees, the person we were with talked about what it looked like, the boats and the bodies. Who throws herself into the ocean after being raped by a sea pirate. I am the pirate, my heart not yet capable of seeing and loving. I'm a member of the Politburo with plenty of power in my hands, and I am the man who has to pay his debt of blood to my people, dying slowly in a forced labor camp. My joy is like spring, so warm it makes flowers bloom all over the earth.

[23:02]

My pain is like a river of trees, so vast it fills the four oceans. Please call me by my true name so I can hear all my cries and my laughter at once. so that I can see that my joy and pain are one. I'll interject here that in Vietnam, I'm not sure that this is true, but I think there were more Quan Yins than Buddhas in Vietnam. Quan Yin was everywhere. Please call me by my true name so I can wake up and be the door of my heart, so the door of my heart can be left open, the door of compassion. There's a little commentary part of it of what he said about this poem. They received lots of letters.

[24:03]

Plum Village, the refugee camps, stories of what had happened. Said how difficult it was. And then one day they received a letter about this 12-year-old girl. And he said... When you first learn of something like that, you get angry at the pirate. You naturally take the side of the girl. And as you look more deeply, you will see it differently. If you take the side of the little girl, then it is easy. You only have to take a gun and shoot the pirate. But we can't do that. my meditation I saw that if I had been born in the village of the pirate and raised in the same conditions as he was I would now be the pirate there is a great likelihood that I would become a pirate I can't condemn myself so easily if we do not do something about this situation

[25:13]

I'll offer it to you in the broadest sense. In 25 years, a certain number of them will become sea pirates or whatever it is that we wish people would stop being and doing. That is certain. After a long meditation, I wrote this poem. Can we look at each other and recognize ourselves in each other? The title of the poem is Please Call Me By My True Names because I have so many names. When I hear one of these names, I have to say yes. Now I want to say, just so you don't think it's Thich Nhat Hanh in another lineage or whatever, the way we parse things up, I want to say something about Suzuki Roshi and something he said. encourages me all the time Suzuki Roshi said amongst other things just say yes I will the point of practice is to get out of dualistic concept concepts and to fill our being with gratitude if you have the actual feeling of your being here then it is the way same thing be here come home body breath

[26:42]

Presence. The only way to be grateful for everything you have, and then he laughed. Suzuki Roshi laughed a lot, and Suzuki Roshi also knew the hell realms of World War II. Make quite sure that you can feel your presence. Feel your feet on the ground. Feel your breath in your belly. Come back. If you don't feel your being, you do not feel you are alive here. It means we're holding our breaths. We're up in our heads, being taken over by something. You do not have any gratitude or joy of life or gratitude for everything. The important thing is just to say, yes, I will. What I do is I just don't know how to do it, have no idea what to do, completely lost, and then I just say, yes, I will. And somehow Suzuki Roshi and all the ancestors are right here, and I still don't know what to do. but at least I'm home.

[27:45]

I'm here. In this way, you can help others, ideally without having any idea about helping. Just to be with people will be enough. Being always with them, without any idea of discrimination, we can help others in its truest sense without giving anything, any special teaching or material. This is actually the Bodhisattva way. Pretty simple, right? And we all know continuous ongoing practice and why we take refuge in Buddha and our own Buddha nature, fly home to. Refuge means fly home to. Fly home to Dharma, the teachings. I love the teachings, but the world is alive with teachings. Listen, show up. It'll teach us everything we need to know. And Sangha, the Maha Sangha of everybody in this room who showed up and everybody online and everybody beyond and beyond and beyond because most fundamentally, and now I'm going to jump to Rebecca Solnit in a minute just so you don't think these are just old Zen guys.

[29:02]

Thich Nhat Hanh said, understanding is he said in this era the Buddha is the Sangha we need each other we so deeply need each other okay Rebecca Solnit this is from a talk some of you may know her she gave this talk at upaya she has a newsletter called meditations in an emergency and this one particularly one was called we were made for this We were made for this. And if you know Rebecca Solnit, she's written a lot about hope. And Rebecca Solnit is not somebody who doesn't see things. But her practice, her vow is hope. So she starts by talking about Hurricane Katrina and all the awful stories that came out of that, which I'm not going to do because I want to tell you other things, too.

[30:10]

She says, we are fed and freed by the good stories. So what happened is all these horrible stories, which we're being bombarded by in these times all the time. I mean, please, I read lots of news. It's just, I need to do that. Some people don't need to do that. And I spent a lot of time reading Dharma and practicing. So we all find our way. So then she says, everybody said all these awful things happened, and then there was bumper-to-bumper boat traffic the morning after the storm hit of people trying to launch their boats to see what they could do for the people of New Orleans. It was an enormous and continued outflow of people wanting to help. that that's our basic nature.

[31:12]

She says, if we show up and take risks, we might help someone. The fact that we cannot save everything does not mean we cannot save anything. And everything and everyone we can save is worth saving. bring this up now because we're in another kind of disaster it is a difficult and scary time but I believe we were made for this it's our true nature to want to help to reach out generosity first paramita Bhikkhu Bodhi I think said said somewhere that the Buddha didn't want to give any formal teachings and to someone unless they first had some basic ground in generosity, like an open-handed, open-heartedness, that that's the ground.

[32:23]

And then the teachings could augment that and support that. But so what is this generosity? She talks about the Bodhisattva vow. Just the first beings are numberless, I vow to liberate. or save them. What a wild thing to vow to keep coming back lifetime after lifetime, to get dirty, to keep working, to toil on behalf of all those numberless beings returning again and again to see what can be done. Look for the liberatory stories, the ones that open doors and take you through the gates, not the ones that slam them. The ones that invite you to expand, not contract. To expand in care, in awareness, in connection. Beings are numberless. I vow to liberate them. This is my life.

[33:25]

And I think it's all of yours. Or you wouldn't be here. What is missing from so many stories is that we need to give. Just find something. Something. Don't get all caught up in that you have to do something political. Some people do that. Others just do something. We give our gifts the gift of our most generous selves. When we are compassionate, we give ourselves the gift of our most compassionate selves. When we are brave, we give ourselves the gift of our most courageous selves. We want to give, to share, to connect, to relieve suffering, to liberate all beings. Doing so gives us meaning, purpose, lets us be our largest, most heroic bodhisattva selves. Yes, I will. There's a certain amount of faith and innocence that

[34:30]

this I love that I'm at Jizo is my most favorite Bodhisattva Jizo pretty much just says yes I will Jizo I'm feeling more humble about this these days but but Jizo loves hell realms it's like how can I go and help and he has an enormous he she he she amount of optimism and care and Tara her leg stepping into the world. There are amazing archetypes and a Manjushri on the altar sitting there wise and stable. Just come sit in this zendo, it'll teach you. I used to work with returning veterans from Iraq and Afghanistan and we would just bring them in here. Now I work with wildland firefighters and we bring them into the zendo at Tassahara and let them walk the pass, you know. It's like, it's pretty simple, actually, and it's continuous.

[35:34]

So I got to where I wanted to end, and I think I'm pretty much on time. No, no, no, but I'm not ending yet, because I have one more thing I want to say. But I'm aware. Then we'll have a little question and answer. Dharma, Heart, Zen, which is the Sangha where I'm a guiding teacher, I asked two wonderful practitioners. They spent about a year on this. On our website, the Soto Zen Buddhist Association, at the beginning of this whole political mess, did a pretty strong, beautiful statement about practicing in these times. And we've had that up there. You can find it on their website. But I wanted something personal for our song that felt close. Same thing, but... language so I wanted to read it to you because I keep reading it a living statement affirming our Bodhisattva vows now the most important thing is it's a living statement it's alive it's like how does this resonate in you what's it touching you I mean and be be real I

[36:54]

I think it's so important to not just say, wow, that was all great. I mean, of course, everything I said was great. But no, but to say, that was hard, or I don't get it, or how do I turn this in myself? So here it is. As we navigate the suffering of our times, we recognize that it is essential to continually renew our bodhisattva vows, remembering that all Buddhism is engaged Buddhism and all of life is is the Buddha body. As such, our practice calls us to fiercely cultivate our ability to witness the cries of the world and to respond with great care. Turning towards one another, bearing witness becomes a vehicle for deeply knowing our interdependence. Responding from the heart of compassion, the illusion of separation is transformed into true solidarity. In Sangha, we endeavor to create conditions where all beings can flourish in practice.

[37:57]

Aware of the suffering caused by othering and polarization, we seek to strengthen the threads that weave us together, becoming a sanctuary of understanding and a refuge for all hearts and bodies. Together, we honor the wisdom of diversity and strive to actualize a path of empathy and dialogue. With responsibility for the lineage and teachings of our Sotos and ancestors, we come together as a community committed to approaching each encounter with the openness and curiosity of beginner's mind. We commit to fostering a community where every voice is cherished, where fear is met with understanding, and where compassion is a living expression of our vows. We invite all beings to gather under the broad canopy of protection and peace. With open hearts and minds, we stand together, vigilant and tender, as guardians of compassion, pledging to respond with grace in the face of adversity.

[39:05]

In our collective practice, may we illuminate the Buddha field of protective care. We realize enlightenment as not some feel-good particular state of mind, but a continuous practice here in this world. Our work towards refuge and liberation is likewise not a destination, but a living expression of our bodhisattva vows. There's a hundred million thousand different ways to say that. This. It's up to each one. What's this mean? What's in your heart? How are you living? What's important? Thank you for listening to this podcast offered by the San Francisco Zen Center. Our Dharma talks are offered at no cost and this is made possible by the donations we receive. Your financial support helps us to continue to offer the Dharma.

[40:07]

For more information, visit sfcc.org and click giving. May we fully enjoy the doymon.

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