I'm so excited I forgot to wear my walker suit. I'm still wet today. I haven't thought about what to say at this moment, but it seemed as if Sister Mary John has essentially And we've had this visit, which will end on Sunday. It's been almost two weeks. And I wanted a chance for my friends to meet her. And this seemed the best way to do it. And I did ask her permission before standing on her top.

[01:05]

And it was a given. without enthusiasm, but it was cute. And I had to remind her that she gives a lot of talks anyway, but this is the first session of the talk. And also, when I go to visit you and your content, I talk to the nuts, so it's even. So, I'd rather not say anything more. Right. Well, I do thank you very much indeed for such a wonderfully warm welcome. And although a Zendo is a strange place, this is the first Zendo I've encountered, I feel very much at home and I feel very much at home with your kindness and your welcome. As Mele has continued to deepen her commitment to Zen, I felt that our relationship has also deepened. perhaps even more strongly than it would with blood ties alone because it seems to me that one of the things we all have in common is that we're trying to live beneath the surface, to go under the surface of life and to find a life that is more abundant than a mere existence.

[02:33]

But I thought it might be more helpful if I spoke first about what I'm beginning to perceive as a divergence and then perhaps we can discuss later on if it is a divergence and to what extent. The difference that I've perceived is that in the Judeo-Christian relationship, tradition, there is a very much more strong sense of relatedness to the ground of our being, to the God who knows us and to whom we seek to align ourselves. Perhaps many of you are already well acquainted with the Judeo-Christian Christian tradition and would know that to Israel the creed really, the great call, the central feature of Israel's life is the call of God to Israel to be his people and he says in the words of the Shema

[04:00]

Here, O Israel, the Lord our God is one God, and you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart, with all your soul, and with all your strength. That is repeated by Jesus in the New Testament, significantly adding, and all your mind. And it is that that we consider to be a vocation, a call to ourselves, to all Christians and all Jews, either notionally or experimentally, and those of us who, for one reason or another, hear it more deeply, seek more deeply, to make it a part of our lives, to be able to respond to that call, to hear, to know, and to love. Although all monastics are very different characters, as I suppose all of you are, there is a common denominator, we find, in a longing to be totally dedicated to the God whom we believe is calling us to know him and to love him, although he is altogether unknowable.

[05:24]

This is what we try to set about doing in following a monastic life as monks from the earliest years have tried to do. The monastic life in the Christian tradition began in full strength in the fourth century when Christianity became the state religion after years, two centuries of persecution. And there were those who sought to retain the purity of the original love and the purity of the call of the gospel by going out into the desert. And there came a great tradition in fourth century Egypt of monks who went out into the desert, mostly alone, but there was guidance for the young monks from the elder monks.

[06:29]

And that was essentially a solitary tradition. But not long after, or really contemporaneously, there were other traditions in Cappadocia with Saint Basil, and also in Lower Egypt with Saint Pachomius, who founded monasteries of Cenobites, as it was called, people who followed a common life, believing as they did that this ideal of common life was truer to the gospel of Christ than the solitary life, because all was being shared. I and my sisters follow the rule of Saint Benedict, which was written in the sixth century in Italy, by Benedict of Nursia. He himself was drawing on this earlier tradition and which combined both the prayer and the solitude of the desert monks and very strongly the tradition of St.

[07:38]

Basil and St. Pecomius of a common life. And the common life in the Benedictine tradition is something that is very important The rule that he devised was based very largely on rules that had existed before his time. But his rule, by the time of the Middle Ages, became the standard monastic rule until reforms of that were necessary. And in the 12th century, when the friars began their own movements, the rule of Saint Benedict was the predominant rule. And what it What it stresses mostly is this biblical obedience to obey the Lord who calls, to try to conform one's life to the pattern that he sets down, both in the law, in the Torah of Israel, and then in the living word that he speaks in Jesus his son.

[08:45]

So this is primarily our call to love him according to the patterns that we find in scripture and preeminently according to the pattern of Christ himself. The rule of Saint Benedict, as I say, stresses obedience. And obedience is a very unpopular virtue, as I hardly need to say, especially in our own time when there is very great emphasis upon self-expression and self-realization. There is also a very strong emphasis upon silence and in our own community the day is very largely silent except for a half an hour when we are free to talk towards the end of the day. There's also a Great stress laid upon reverence and upon humility and upon the common life and what the common life asks of us in terms of personal dispossession.

[10:01]

Mele suggested that it might be helpful if I tried to embroider a bit upon what we find to be the elements of silence that are particularly important. And the rule itself says that we are silent primarily because we are constant disciples. We are not teachers. We are those who are always learning and always following. To lead a life of silence, as you will certainly know, is a great challenge, and it's a knife edge in a way, because in the silence, one is far more aware of one's interior clamor than of the noises without, and it's the interior clamor which is by far the more troublesome to deal with. But if we persevere,

[11:11]

in seeking God in the silence that is given. The silence itself will allow us to hear more deeply as the Shema teaches. To hear what God is saying in scripture, in our fellow beings, and in the events of life. How all this is to lead us back to God. And then finally, there's a silence there is an element in silence that will be certainly familiar to you because I'm well aware of it here in the Zen Do and it's a silence of reverence and reverence as I understand it is a very important feature in Japanese understanding and life and it's something that is very beautiful and something that is very earnestly cultivated in our monastic life reverence for the way we handle things for the way we encounter one another and reverence for the we try to cultivate a growing reverence for the things of the earth and for all things knowing that we too are things of the earth and not the masters

[12:33]

But the silence that I find here I think perhaps makes me feel most at home. It is a focused, concentrated silence and one that I appreciate very much. So perhaps this has brought us back to where I began, the area of our convergence rather than our divergence. But the two will interact and I'm sure fruitfully. If you'd like to come back at me with any questions or comments, I would welcome them. Yes. You know, I was thinking about what you were saying about our divergence, and that it had something to do with the relationship with the ground of our being. And while I'm not sure if there's a kind of an allergy in Buddhism to just using the word God,

[13:45]

but they absolutely use ground of being. So my own thoughts about relatedness is that we're very connected to the ground of our being, but it's not personified. Yes. Right. Yes. So the relationship is with everything that is, and not through one central. interchange there. Well, personhood is a very important concept. Certainly in Christianity, I would hesitate to assert that about Judaism, but God is the living God, and certainly there is a personal relationship that is cultivated through the practice of the law. Yes, but I think that that's a little bit different. It is. Because, well, there's a personal relationship to the Buddha and the ancestors.

[14:48]

The material, the ground of their being is the same as we are, which is a little different, I think, than Christianity. Yes, yes, but who is God? The more we seek to know God, and this is one of St. Benedict, this is the first of St. Benedict's requirements of anyone who comes to the monastery, is he truly seeking God? there are other qualifying requirements but that is the first one and this is that is what we're that's what draws us is the seeking of God and the more we seek him the more unknowable he becomes and yet we believe ourselves to be apprehended yeah it's a little bit of the opposite I think in that in Buddhism it's more unknown I'm very happy to meet you.

[16:01]

I'm Andrea. Yes. And I'm glad to see you here. I was wondering, you know, if we go to the monastery here, usually we say, oh, we stay a few years, yes yes yes yes yes yes of loving god Yeah, and you said, and to love God. Yes. And I was wondering what that means. Yes, what does that mean? Yes. It's asserted that God is love. And we use, we can trivialize love so easily.

[17:03]

In coming to know God, we come to know love. And God, as he reveals himself in Christ, as he speaks in our human language in a human man, reveals himself as a totally self-giving love, pouring himself out, even to a very ignominious death. And that is the love that we are trying to learn. It's a love that's that's so costly that we must give all for it. And it's a love that is also deeply mysterious whose features we go on learning as we are able to apprehend them. But it is a very mysterious question. And then the first question about the staying, the life commitment to the monastery.

[18:07]

Yes, we are different here. It is fully expected that we make a life commitment to our monastic practice. And for Benedictines, the three vows that are made are those of stability, conversion of life, and obedience, rather than poverty, chastity, and obedience, which came in with the mendicant orders in the 13th century. So stability partly presupposes a lifetime's commitment to staying with what you have begun to seek. And because we consider the monastic seeking a lifetime's adventure, and probably more than a lifetime, we are committed for life. To the same place, to the same... To the same community, not necessarily the same place. I mean, it could be that our community would have to move elsewhere at some point, but we are committed to that particular group of people to whom we've made... among whom we have made our profession.

[19:19]

Yeah, I'd like to also kind of address the issue of divergence. I think it's... It's interesting, with a religion such as the Judeo-Christian tradition, in which, and certainly in the Christian part of that, love is so primary. And yet the word love is, as far as I know, virtually never used in Buddhism. But the word compassion is what's used most frequently. But given the fact that we have two traditions in the world, Christian and Buddhist, one which stresses love and the other compassion, both very, I would say, constructive or helpful aims, it's a wonder to me that still these two

[20:27]

groups or traditions steadfastly maintain, are steadfastly divergent. In other words, cannot, in some sense, there's no melding, there's no blending. And I think that the issue that Grace brought up is an interesting one. It's about the personhood. toward which our attention is directed. In Buddhism, we do not, as Grace pointed out, personify the ground of being. And I think that in my conversations with Christians and Jews, it's clear to me that the divergent, the reason why these loving and compassionate people cannot

[21:36]

be together is because one group absolutely insists upon the personhood God and the other group personhood is somehow cannot be the focus. Yes. Now, it's interesting, you talk about love of God. to love God with all of one's strength. And yet, in Buddhism, the compassion we direct is not toward God, but toward every other conceivable being in creation. And I think that from a Buddhist perspective, I wonder if To me, this is very different than to love all of being, no matter how humble, and to completely ignore any kind of overarching entity.

[22:54]

In fact, to simply not include any idea of it. monotheistic notion of God and of directing one's whole heart toward God, does that subtract from one's love of the lesser beings in this creation? No, I would say it enables it. Because, as we believe, God so loved the world that he poured himself out in Christ as one of the beings And so, our worship is primarily to God, but it is enabled, enabled by his love to love others. And it's, in a sense, it's commanded by his love to love others.

[23:56]

Yeah. I can sort of see that, but sometimes it seems to me, you know, we have had a lot of But there has been so much strife in the world over religion. And it seemed as if some of that strife was people who love God so much, they felt the need to defend him against others. And so others ended up being loved less than God. But that's a total inversion, isn't it? If people feel they need to defend God, they're only defending an idol. It's God who can only vindicate himself. And I'm sure God needs no defense. No, but it certainly has happened most disastrously throughout human history.

[25:05]

Is it acceptable in any of the Catholic theologies to believe that God is imminent in all of his or her creation? Yes, it is. Yes. It is a monotheistic religion in which there is God, so it's not pantheistic. We couldn't go so far as to say that that God is to be worshipped in creatures, but because all creatures belong to God and are made by God, they are eminently worthy of, well, they belong to Him and are worthy of our love and our reverence as His. But not as Him. Not as Him. And it seems to me that that is where our common ground is, and the reverence that you talked about earlier.

[26:17]

Except that I would, in sort of building on Grace's point, imagine that we practice from the point that we are already Buddha, we are already enlightened, and there's not a separation, and there's not a striving or an attainment, there's an uncovering and a realization that needs to happen. But it's already there and it seems to me that in the Judeo-Christian tradition there is a separation and there is something outside and this driving, although there's a lot of inner life, this driving is from the inside toward the outside. That's how it seems to me. We believe that we are given the total treasure in baptism, which is the entrance into Christianity. And what our life following that is the appropriation of that treasure. We have it all, but we need to make it our own fully and allow it to be in our persons.

[27:26]

Can you tell us a little bit about your schedule? I also have a question, how do you guide the sisters in their obedience and at the same just go along with the group and not... It is. Yes, it is or it isn't, depending on characters. I mean, there are some natural rebels who just hate it. And who find it very difficult to go along with the herd. But the ground of our obedience is the obedience that is revealed in Christ.

[28:29]

And obedience is essentially a matter of hearing and of harmony. And it's the harmony and the hearing that we want to try and cultivate in our lives. We have the rule of Saint Benedict which, as a 6th century rule for men, doesn't really always apply in the letter to present day English women. but there is a body of customs of how we're going to interpret that rule and that body is always open to re-evaluation but it's there and we all know precisely how we ought to respond in certain circumstances and there are the rebels who often maintain a healthy rebellion. Obedience is something that

[29:31]

primarily needs to be responsible. It can't be imposed. If someone is consistently disobeying, I have to point out to her that this is not the practice to which we're committed. Why do you feel you must diverge in this way? And perhaps it's just something that's more convenient for her. And if it is, then I have to point out that this is not what we're committed to. And let's rethink. I think, basically, when there are problems in obedience, and there are constantly problems in obedience for all of us, the abbess especially, it is a call, in a sense, to refocus our vision on the obedient Christ, that this, we believe, He is the way to the Father, of giving Himself in that essential core of the being of each one of us, which is the will.

[30:37]

and I want to give my will to God and this in the way of monastic life is the way it has been set out to do and it's quite simple but anything but easy. As for the schedule of the day, the day is wrapped up in silence as I said apart from the half hour in the afternoon on normal weekdays we have more time for talking and socializing on Sundays. We rise at four, and our first service, which we call offices, which are services of readings and prayers, takes place at half past four, and that's the longest one. And it's a very meditative office in which Psalms, which are biblical poetry of all sorts of human responses. There are lyrics of high exaltation and there are the most bloodthirsty curses and there are historical reflections and wisdom reflections.

[31:51]

It's quite a medley of human emotion. But the Psalms make up most of our worship And so we have this long office of vigils which goes on for about 50 minutes. Then there's an hour and a half for a silent prayer and reading of the Bible or of related books. Then a short office which is the dawn office. And then we have the Eucharist at half past seven. Then breakfast. then another very short office and about three hours for manual work because we support ourselves on our own grounds and we don't leave the grounds normally. Following that there's a short midday office and about a quarter of an hour of again prayer which we try to devote for peace in the world.

[32:56]

Then there's a dinner and an hour and a half of more manual work, another short office, the inevitable cup of tea, an hour of free time, and then the half hour for talk, the evening office of vespers, an hour and a quarter for, again, personal prayer and reading, then a light supper and the cleaning up, the last office of the day, which is called Compline, and then bed at eight. It's a very simple life, and the simplicity itself has its own austerity, but time is set apart for God. The time is consecrated, the whole of the life is consecrated to worship, really, and the worship is focused in these little times of common

[33:58]

and personal prayer. So the prayer talk is communal as well as sometimes individual? Yes, yes. Yes? Maybe you spoke about this before I came in, but I was curious about going to England long ago, when you chose to do that, and how that impacted your inner life changing your nationality. Yes. And living and becoming English. In an alien culture, yes. It is. It's very different. And I wonder if you would speak a little bit about how that has been for you over the years. Living in England. Becoming English. Yes. Well, I stumbled into the Abbey rather by accident, never dreaming that I could ever belong to such a rigorous and committed life.

[35:07]

But when I stumbled in, I somehow had a very deep sense that I'd come home. And I thought I was going to join a community here in the States. But having felt this so strongly, that home was actually at Westmoreland in Kent, in England, my parents, with their typical generosity, allowed me to try before I was 21. And we all thought that I'd get it out of my system quite quickly. But it didn't work that way. It just sort of went more into my system. And I've been learning ever since what home is. which seemed intimately familiar and at once alien in this very formal English culture. And because we don't go out very much, we're not very exposed to the outside world. People who have visited us say, how quaint you are.

[36:13]

This is probably what life was like in the 19th century. And so we are, as an enclosed community, I suppose all the more set apart in our ways. And it is a very English community, and it never ceases to surprise me that there are five Americans there and another on the way, and the other communities that are so much more open can't seem to cope with Americans. I don't understand why, but we, all of us, we come independently and although it is a very much more formal culture than anything we've been used to here, we somehow find ourselves at home and able to be free in a most unexpected way. Do you find that the enclosure and formality of English in my speculation, in this country?

[37:21]

I don't know. I really don't know. I will have to think about that. I've always imagined that if we were ever in a position to make a daughter house in this country, our ways would have to change in order to adapt. But we Americans have adapted without too much difficulty to this alien culture. Yes? I was wondering on what level or in what way would you find a convergence between Christian prayer and meditation, Buddhist meditation? Buddhist meditation. probably don't know enough about Buddhist meditation and there's a lot I have yet to learn about Christian prayer. So are you sitting in the Zen doors?

[38:25]

Yes, well I feel at home just in the silence, in the focused concentrated emptiness in which we seek to deepen our own silence to become more empty and receptive to whatever God is trying to give to us through scripture or through other people or through the events of our lives. As far as I've been able to perceive what the convergences are, are a very exacting discipline in both instances, but a focused discipline. It's not just just a kind of masochistic asceticism. I think, as far as I understand, we're all trying to open ourselves more deeply to what Karen suggested, or what our exchange suggested, is our birthright, however we understand that birthright, to be more fully ourselves through a disciplined practice.

[39:41]

Does that answer it in any way? I think so. I think what you said, that it's in an opening. You used that word. And that word would make sense to me. And it converges for both of them. Can I push a little bit more on what to do here when you come in the morning? Yes. And you said, do you, are you using words a lot? Sometimes, sometimes. Yes, sometimes I'm using a mantra. Yeah. And sometimes, I don't, well the mantra is always inside and doesn't need to be explicit. Sometimes it needs to be very explicit. Just because I'm all over the place. Yes. So you focus, you try to keep your attention on the mantra. Yes. And sometimes it's the word and sometimes it's the silence. Sometimes there's just the silence. Yes?

[40:45]

I have three questions. Right. Number one, do you consider your daily schedule as a form of meditation as you go through the day? What are the various activities you engage in during meditation? Yes, because it is all sort of knitted together in silence. The whole life, as one goes on in it, we come to see more and more as a total life of worship. Whether we're peeling the veg or printing or washing up or whatever. Because of the way we approach things and approach one another and work with one another, it is, and because of the total life is focused towards God, the whole of the life is worship. But it is focused in these little offices. It's made explicit what we're trying to do. But the unity of it all grows upon us as we go along.

[41:47]

I think as more unifying rather than sort of this, this, this, this and this of coming together of I hope taking a deeper hold of my person of my whole being so that my being is more focused than it was 34 years ago and that my being may be more truly a worshipful being a worshipping being. How have you experienced your own aging in the thirty-four years? It's really rather exciting. I can't quite understand why people are allergic to growing older because life is very exciting and why should we be ashamed of growing older and growing more deeply into it.

[43:00]

Do you find yourself more excited now than 34 years ago? I think so, yes. The last question. That's Laura. That's all right. How do you find yourself in the world now? Do you feel at home out of there after 34 years? Now that's a very interesting question. This is something I'm trying to sort out, because I don't, I so seldom go out. And when I go out, it's usually to the doctor or the dentist, and you know, you just get home as, again, as quickly as you can after that. I say this very tentatively, because I'm, it's something I'm trying to explicate to myself. And I've been working on it a little bit with Mele, I really feel that I'm more me there than anywhere else.

[44:03]

I can't say that I feel a fish out of water, but I do feel I'm more truly me when I'm there back in the community with all the tensions that are there, all the problems that are going to meet me. and all the things that I wrestle with, and all the things that I rejoice in. But I think I'm most at home right there in the community. Thank you very much for coming. Thank you so much for having me. I was wondering which me you were talking about in Buddhism. we talk about the small mind and the big mind, and I was wondering if there was anything comparable in your own practice, and which part of you felt more at home there? Because there's a very big part of you, obviously, that seems so at home here.

[45:10]

Yes. Yes, can you say precisely what is the small mind and the big mind? I think I can understand. It sounds a bit familiar. Well, sort of maybe the conflict between my personality and my capacity as a human being. What is it to be a human being in the world? As opposed to... You see, my little ego, you mean? Yeah. Yes. Yes, I know a lot about my little ego. We all do. Yes. So which part of you feels like you feel more at home back there? Well I think, hmm, I suppose the whole of me really, both the little ego, which bumps into lots of other little egos there, and the bigger ego into which, or the bigger me, the bigger self let's say, into which we're all growing. Is that because you feel

[46:13]

I do feel supported, but I feel quite supported here. I think maybe it's because we are committed to one another and all committed to the same end there. Different as we are, not altogether naturally homogeneous there. There are the human tensions. The commitment of all of us is something that swallows up eventually, the little ego. And I think that's where I feel most at home. Though I can't say I feel in an alien land here. I'm sorry, I haven't quite got it counted up exactly. There are 33 of us and one in Australia. We've lent one to help a small community in Australia.

[47:17]

And she will be coming home at the end of the year. Yes. This may sound like a strange question, but do you experience as if you experience different degrees of silence? Yes, I certainly do. Yes. Can you describe some of those differences? Of the differences? I suppose it would be a superficial silence would be one that I'm struggling for and a deeper silence would be one that just seems altogether given and enveloping me. Do you experience anything like this in Zazen?

[48:19]

Yes I do and I think I had never really focused on the differences until I heard you describe it in kind of applying different degrees of silence. Yes and sometimes it's just very difficult to get into it and sometimes it just takes hold of you, unbidden it seems. Sometimes it takes hold of one in very unusual circumstances, in the midst of a great deal of exterior noise. This is not so much a question as a statement, I just wanted to, just to listen to you, just talk more about the similarity with the convergence. Those who are really committed, no matter what the path they take, I think in your case, the strictness of thought is very similar to the one we take here.

[49:26]

And silence, though it may vary, I think in the end, we all take different paths, but with the same goal. Yes. It's what I sort of hear. I think we may one day recognize this. And this is why I feel that interfaith dialogue is extremely important. We have so much to learn from one another. Yes. I just want to say, I have no doubt that ultimately we are doing the same thing because, you know, whether there is a God who is a person or whether there is not a God who is a person, the devotion to knowing what this world is or what is actually the case.

[50:38]

I think that Buddhists are totally devoted to knowing what is actually the case, experiencing life truly. And I think that that is also the intent of Christians and Jews to honestly know what it is to be alive. So I don't have any doubt that we're about the same thing. But what occurs to me, When people pursue, say, the Buddhist path, and over a long period of time, I always ask them, you know, they come here all the time, these 20 and 30 year duration Buddhists, and I always want to know, I always want to know what And it's always very difficult for me to get a sense of that from them.

[51:49]

So I want to ask you the same sort of question. Given that being closer to God or being connected to God or with God in some way, it seems to me, is the intent of your devotion. What have you uncovered or what do you know that you didn't know before about God? What is your experience of God? I think in a way it's totally paradoxical that he's far more unknowable than I would have imagined. and yet somehow more closely known and I think perhaps this is because of our practice we are more aware that we are known by him than that we know him and in our practice really what we find ourselves trying to do is to allow ourselves to be known by him

[53:16]

Do you? I'm not sure that I do. But it's a very different thing to make oneself transparent and available, to be known, than to be trying to see or know or penetrate. But he's so much greater. And that's, I think that is my experience, that in a sense the more I seek, the more unknowable it all becomes and yet the more compelling. Yes. image of God and certainly Jesus and the Buddha stuff.

[54:31]

And I was on College Avenue today and there was a wonderful little carving of Buddha. Oh, there's Buddha. So I thought, oh, I know you. Yes. And that was very powerful. Yes. And so I wonder whether personality that has a visual form of Jesus, and even of God. Whether that's something to be wary of, or that you allow it to happen? Oh, I think one can allow it to happen, just so long as you are aware somewhere in your mind that this is a pointer and not the end. It's something that's perhaps enlarging consciousness, but it's not going to be the final goal ever of one's consciousness.

[55:41]

What is comfortable and known, you mean? I think, do we understand one another, that images that come can be very useful, can be very stimulating, can be challenging, provoking, but they can never be the end of the story. Does that answer? Are we communicating? by hallucinatory or experiences in being miraculously dramatic and terrible.

[57:57]

Yes, indeed. That's a very strong element in it.

[58:01]

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