Universal Spirituality

Hey all,  just came across this page and thought I'd stop by.   We have a local zendo "Morning Star Zendo" that is established by Catholic Jesuits to teach Zen concepts,  and practice zazen.

I've been there to speak a few times,  and I find it fascinating the ideas that meld Christianity and Zen together.   I myself was raised a Roman Catholic,  educated in Jesuit schools,  and converted to Buddhism at 17 years old.  Through Buddhism I found Zen,  and have been an active member of the NYC Zen community since.

I recently had correspondence with a Christian Zen group,  that was struggling at what precepts of Zen were most important to bring into their lives,  and in response I wrote this spetsnazq2.livejournal.com/1371.ht… blog post.  Which I thought was very important,  considering many outside the buddhist community come to zen through literature.  This can cause a problem because unlike many religions,  faith and dogma are not necessary,  only sitting zazen.

So,  how did you guys come across zen?

Привет всем!

Я тут совсем не долго, давайте знакомиться!

Вот, если что, мой адрес: kjk123@inbox.ru

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Good evening, all, I'm a twenty-three year old Christian in the most loose sense of the word and I thought that this looked like an interesting place to get some information. I basically just wanted to say hello before I started posting and asking questions.

Angel

Also, if anyone has any interesting avatars for this community, please e-mail them to me at zenchristianity@gmail.com. Make sure it fits the file types for LJ as the problem I'm having is that my image program isn't working right now so I can't edit the image type for the neat avatars I've found online.

Thanks, Everyone!!!

Melissa :)
Zen Christianity Owner/Maintainer

Sorry this group has gotten off to a slow start. This is the first group I've ever started/maintained here on LJ. I have been away for several months and am just now getting back to a place where this has again become a priority. Hopefully we will have more posts and more interest now that I've changed some of the settings here to allow non-members to post without being moderated. With these new settings, I won't have to be here in order to keep this group going. If anyone is interested in helping me moderate, please drop a note to the group's new e-mail address at zenchristianity@gmail.com. Again, let me apologize it's taken me this long. Thanks for your understanding!!!

Melissa :)
Zen Christianity Owner/Maintainer

I've been doing a lot of thinking about my spirituality lately. I came across a Zen center about 6 blocks from my apartment and decided to look into the practices a bit more.

Being raised in a Christian household, I wasn't sure if it would be wrong to even think of pursuing Zen and needed to find my own answers and knew I couldn't ask those who spiritually guided me in the past. I know what their views are - and they don't entirely mesh with my internal feelings. I swung by my local library and right off the bat - first isle, shelf, RIGHT there in front of my face was a book called Zen for Christians by Kim Boykin.  It really helped me understand the basics of Zen and that my feelings are totally normal and really got me excited about learning more. 

I highly recommend this book for persons wanting to know the basics - especially if you find your mind caught like mine was.

I look forward to being part of this group.

I stumbled across this community and thought it sounded a something like the path I've found myself on lately. My name is Laura and I'm 26, married to an amazing man (soon-to-be an intern pastor when we move to MT), and am always looking for ways to learn more, live more, connect more, hope more and trust more. Maybe that's where you all will come in on my path. ;)

Draw near to God and he will draw near to you. Shalom, Laura