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A moment of appreciation of genuine diversity

I have no intent to politicize this forum in any way...but...I was watching a speech by Barack Obama on race and politics. He quoted what he called an altruism saying, "The most segregated hour of American life occurs on Sunday morning."

I thought, "Wow. How fortunate we are, that this statement is in no way true of our spiritual community." I was stunned, but not at all surprised, that in other communities amidst the rhetoric of "love thy neighbor" that there still can be such tension and divisiveness in the hearts of practitioners. I took a moment to feel heartfelt appreciation for how different our Buddhist community is from other organized spiritual groups...that we have managed to balance the potential trappings of organizing people on a spiritual basis and maintaining genuine diversity on every level. This is so true that I think it is easy not to notice, easy to forget...it is very easy to overlook what is NOT there...perhaps hard to remember to appreciate what IS there until there is some contrast that makes it stand out.

So, I am taking an opportunity to thoughtfully appreciate that this Buddhist community manifests its ideals so eloquently and genuinely, that it hardly merits notice...and I thought I would see if any one else care to share any thoughts of such appreciation.

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Replies to This Discussion

Permalink Reply by Dan (site assistant) on March 20, 2008 at 1:01pm: Ditto! It doesn't have to 'racial.'

For years, my dad helped to establish an all-Filipino church in Chicago. But from that, about 4 churches branched out over time not because of a need to 'spread Christ's message of love & humanity' but simply because of personality conflicts, disputes on rules or choice of pastors, feuds & alliances or egos that clashed because of irreconcilable differences.

best,

Dan; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by Lisa Stratton on March 20, 2008 at 6:17pm: Thank you, Dan. My own early life was filled with many of those ego-driven conflicts in organized religion. So much so, that I have been a little....suspicious of organized religion in general...and so that I have to be mindful of that influence and really work at rising above that conditioning in my early development. There was so much (and still is in many communities) focus on all of the areas that people disagreed on and so little appreciation for what they had in common...so much bickering over ugly rather than embracing beauty...even sermons delivered about how right one group is and how wrong another group is....self righteousness for the sake of self righteousness. (I say all of that with compassion for all of them, for choosing not to cleanse and purify their own energies but rather exacerbate their own suffering and the suffering of others, causing suffering rather than causing relief of suffering.)

Our family actually kind of followed a minister that had been ousted in some churches. Since those things were very ego-driven on every side and were full of very ugly disharmony but not really race related, I had not thought about that until reading your response. Very recently a friend of mine who is in the Unity church had her minister ousted by some vocal, disgruntled, unappreciative members of unpopular opinion.

So there is yet another layer of appreciation for this community for me to consider. Thanks for that opportunity!; ▶ Reply to This

Permalink Reply by James Ryan on March 20, 2008 at 7:20pm: Hear Hear! I too thought, "How fortunate am I that I belong to such a faith organization like SGI that transcends all that racial crap."

Of course, we have to continue to fight to make sure all are welcome and treated as equals - whether they be black, white, straight, gay, rich, poor etc.; ▶ Reply to This

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