Category Archives: Information

The Precious Jewel – Nothing More Intimate

June 20, 2009 Mugo Leave a comment

Rev. Berwyn was the celebrant (for the Healing Buddha Festival Ceremony). He gave the following dedication at the start of the ceremony:

Bhaisajyagaguru Tathagata, the master of healing, vows to be like a radiant jewel of lapis lazuli, illuminating the lives of all those in the darkness of suffering. What is this bright Jewel? Although it is most precious, we need never fear losing it. Although we cannot own it, there is nothing more intimate.

From the THBA website, new News section.

Yes, we now have a News section on the Throssel site. We are not sure how often it will be updated, however if you subscribe to the RSS feed you will know promptly when new material is posted.

Daily Life, Information

Are Animals Conscious Of Their Behaviour?

June 5, 2009 Mugo 2 Comments

Apparently animals are conscious of their behaviour and can exhibit regret. Just like us!

He (Eugene Linden) tells of a young tiger that, after tearing up all the newly planted trees at a California animal park, covered his eyes with his paws when the zoo-keeper arrived. And there were the female chimpanzees at the Tulsa Zoo that took advantage of a renovation project to steal the painters’ supplies, don gloves and paint their babies solid white. When confronted by their furious keeper, the mothers scurried away, then returned with peace offerings and paint-free babies.

Read more….
Looks like there may be a case to be made for humans being wired to regret. Just like the animals!

Thanks to Jack for the link.

Thankfully we humans do not require shows of regret in order to express remorse. And it is a sad sad world that sometimes DOES require a show of regret…

Falls Between the Cracks, Information

Celebrity – Notoriety

June 3, 2009 Mugo 3 Comments

I’ve been encountering a lot of Travellers (See also Gypsies and Romini people) on the road and encamped on every available (and unavailable) spot beside the roads! They are on their way to the Appleby Horse Fair which customarily starts on the first Thursday in June and ends on the second Wednesday in June. When I passed through on Monday morning Alston had ponies tied to lamp posts, their rear ends stuck out into the road. Two officers of the law were walking purposefully towards the clutch of caravans, trucks, lorries loaded with painted caravans and sundry other vehicles. They were all crammed onto a tiny spot of land beside the road on the edge of the town. I must say I delighted in the general mill of activity, and the basic anarchy that emanates from Travellers activity. I think the police are fairly tolerant of them unless there is out and out crime going on. Just outside of Alston more encampments, ponies turned out into farmers fields, permission or no as I understand the situation. Is it a crime to feed ponies that have been trotting for 20 miles, they need their grass? (Paraphrased from the local newspaper reporting on the Travellers excesses or more to the point the farmers indignation.) Then descending Hartside Pass in the brilliant summer sunshine two carts – one a ‘rag and bone’ painted beautifully the other a simple pony cart. The ponies swinging along at a brisk trot, full of the joy of the open road, wind under the tail and feathery legs flying. What a sight! There’s that welling up of emotion out of seeming nowhere again. I’ll have to get to the bottom of that.

And now to what I intended to write about. Celebrity and notoriety. Yes, celebrity and how a swift turn of events, combined with human frailty, can transform over night into notoriety. This is the stuff of entertainment. The rise and fall of celebrity. We love the rags to riches stories, the Cinders WILL go to the ball stories. Now we have the story of Susan Boyle. It will, no doubt, be an ongoing one. Where will we be in that story? What of our own story?

Information, Teachings

Road Side Recycling

May 30, 2009 Mugo 1 Comment

Rubbish gathered on a walk around the block.

Lets take bags with us, she said. There’s SO much rubbish accumulated on the grass verges. I want to pick it up. So we walked and stooped and walked and stooped our way around, what we call, the block. When we leave the monastery either by car or on foot we sign out with our destination and time of leaving. That way if there is a fire (not happened yet) everybody can be quickly accounted for. Such is community living, involving a high level of consideration for others.

I guess our walk ‘n stoop walk was about consideration for others in a certain way, as well as just simple civic mindedness. So we walked up the road towards the T junction, left towards Allendale going gradually up hill then left over a gate into the monastery property and down to the main buildings. That’s our country block and it takes just under an hour, walking briskly, to get around. Two of us collected two large shopping bags of rubbish. All sorts of rubbish however, as I recall, no Tetra Pak cartons.

There’s Tetra Pak getting a mention again. Opening the fridge to day and pulling out a smoothie carton I saw on the package that Tetra has a website. Impressive site, impressive company.

And now confession time. The rubbish we collected…went directly into the rubbish bin, unsorted. Shame on us. However like everything that is good to do one can get a tad over-the-top obsessive. And worse – virtuous in an externalised kind of way.

Daily Life, Information, Teachings

A Buddhist Declaration on Climate Change

May 27, 2009 Mugo 4 Comments

It is with some trepidation that I post on the Buddhist Declaration on Climate Change because it is important not to (even implicitly) sell my views and opinions through the vehicle of Jade. This blog is aimed at a deeper level of our functioning while, at the same time, acknowledging that we live in a complex world which asks much of us; to unconditionally engage with it. To notice, acknowledge and respond to what’s here sensitively, intelligently, and above all from where the Precepts call back to us, is the only way I know. To prescribe action, or inadvertently to do that, may remove one several levels away from the gift of personal responsibility.

Trouble is our culture tends to feel that to be fair both sides of the argument must be presented! Debate is seen as a self evident good. As if (to use that wonderful teeny expression). As if there were just two sides to anything at all. As if debate in itself is good, or the path to wise action. Might be, might not be. Complexity yes. Yet how to respond? Compassion has to come first, doing nothing is not an option, although, sometimes doing nothing is doing a great deal.

Confused? Depressed? Wish the whole matter (in this instance climate change) were a bad dream? Want to bury your head under the duvet ’till morning? Such thoughts are the stuff of Buddhist practice, what ever one is attempting to ignore. Climate Change or the fact you didn’t recycle that tetra pack juice container, when you knew you could have, asks of us to lift ourselves out of our beds and take a look. Honestly.

Having talked my way towards this declaration, here is orientation to the statement:

In the run-up to the crucial U.N. Climate Treaty Conference in Copenhagen in December 2009, the Declaration that follows will present to the world’s media a unique spiritual view of climate change and our urgent responsibility to address the solutions. It emerged from the contributions of over 20 Buddhist teachers of all traditions to the book A Buddhist Response to the Climate Emergency. The Time to Act is Now was composed as a pan-Buddhist statement by Zen teacher Dr David Tetsuun Loy and senior Theravadin teacher Ven. Bhikkhu Bodhi with scientific input from Dr John Stanley.

The Dalai Lama was the first to sign this Declaration. We invite all concerned members of the international Buddhist community to study the document and add their voice by co-signing it at the end of this page.

The statement follows…

Have I signed? I’m not saying. Climate change is at once a huge matter of immediate global concern and…how one responds (the details of that response), both inwardly and outwardly, is unique unto each of us.

As in this instance so in every instance of our responding.

Jade Mountains Buddha Hall