Buddhism doesn’t need saints

 And by the way, don’t cry too much over Thích Nhất Hạnh.

Dorothy Day said: "Don't call me a saint, I don't want to be dismissed that easily." Of course Timothy Dolan, the Archbishop of New York, proposed her for canonization as soon as he could. The old left wing Catholic in me finds it ironic that a man who is the complete antithesis of the kind of life Day proposes for a modern Christian calls her Blessed Dorothy. She might accuse him of dampening her radical voice, even silencing the anarchist grandmother who confounded comfortable notions, but I wouldn't hesitate, not even for a nano second.

Pushing for sainthood lets purveyors of religious doublespeak, cults, snake oil and associated pyramid schemes off the hook for their flagrant sins. I will also argue that the whole rigmarole of canonization is just lip service to what Jesus calls Christians to do. We don’t really have to go and take care of lepers. Saint Damien did it. Pray to him that we be spared. Or in the case of the Founder of the Catholic Worker, someone can take care of the castoffs our materialistic culture dumps on the Bowery as long as it’s not me or my kids.

One of the reasons that the leaders of the Protestant Reformation dismissed saints was to end the superstitious practice of encasing some bones in the local cathedral to entice lucrative pilgrim spending as well as defund the Papal ponzi scheme of selling indulgences to cover the extravagant cost of building Saint Peter’s in Rome. Every organized religion needs a building maintenance fund so this might be just have been marketing but it has always felt a bit underhanded to me.

There are some people who want to make Issan Dorsey into a Buddhist saint--gotta have a saint in high heels. Of course we could do worse. 

Before I started work at  Maitri Hospice, the Dalai Lama’s rain-maker, the Yogin Yeshe Dorje visited. He and Issan got on very well, one of those connections. The rainmaker grabbed Issan and said, “You’ve created Buddhist Heaven.” Issan laughed. Later when I asked Issan about the visit, he smiled and said, “He was a very nice man, but he didn’t pay the water bill.”

All that is just a preface to something that has been creeping to the surface as the tributes pour in for Thầy, “The Saint of Mindfulness, Beloved Thích Nhất Hanh,” and I need to say it. Whether he really was a very nice Buddhist dude, or even if he was just an ordinary flawed human like the rest of us, don't for a minute think that the work of being mindful, practicing, looking after our interconnected world can be done by anyone else but us, and that includes all the difficult bits. Don’t waste a lot of tears or weave nostalgic odes about all the really good teachers dying. The Lord Buddha died too, quite a few years back.

We can't allow ourselves to get distracted by any cult of personality. We can't get off the hook no matter how hard, by whatever devious means we try. We have to do the work ourselves.

I began with the caution from Blessed Dorothy Day undermining the whole sanctification scheme, and I will close with a hopeful note from the same complicated woman who lived an exemplary life, "The world will be saved by beauty." Amen.

Nobodaddy

January 18th, 2022

At this particular moment in the current debate about the Jesus prayer, strained as it is, I come down firmly on the side of “dangerous.” For the meditator, it’s a step down from that lyric on the car radio that stays in your head, and you can’t turn off. Instead of prison and mother, it weaves a lovely spell of angels and divine nectar. Perhaps this is not the danger that the fathers of the Eastern Church warn about, but nonetheless a danger.

The repetition starts out as a simple concentration exercise, riding the breath like 123. The terrain is familiar, but the vehicle is clumsy and unpredictable, like an imaginary Model A Ford. Boredom sets in as stories & associated phantasms begin to loop, and on that radio a lyric purporting to be from the son of David pops up, or, my favorite, the thespian voice of the god of Abraham faking Aristotle. Rattling around the head’s Netherspace, it’s a wily enemy, playacting to hold onto power. It wants to be accepted as "the Truth." 

If we don’t play close scrutiny, it maintains secret sway over our choices and our futures. But we might get lucky enough to understand deeply that we alone, no one else, sustain the imagined conversations and images that flow through the mind. This moment of enlightenment can strike instantaneously! 

Avoid the loud applause.

To Nobodaddy 

by William Blake 

Why art thou silent & invisible 

Father of Jealousy 

Why dost thou hide thyself in clouds 

From every searching Eye 

Why darkness & obscurity 

In all thy words & laws 

That none dare eat the fruit but from 

The wily serpents jaws 

Or is it because Secresy 

gains females loud applause 

UriZen, William Blake

The Dynamism of Desire, A book conversation

Lonergan and The Exercises of Saint Ignatius

The following conversation about The Dynamism of Desire, Bernard J. F. Lonergan, S.J. on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola* was recreated from several emails. The participants are Morgan Zo-Callahan (MZC), Robert Rahl (RRR), Joe Mitchell (JM), John Lounibos (JL), Don Maloney (DM), Gene Bianchi (GB).

All but Mitchell and Maloney are contributors to Intimate Meanderings; personal information is in the first pages of the book. By way of introduction Joe Mitchell is an enthusiastic student and facilitator for Non Violent Communication (Marshall Rosenberg). He was a Jesuit from '62-'71. Don Maloney lives in Okinawa, Japan, where he teaches for the University of Maryland Asian Division. He was a Jesuit from '52-'83.

MZC: I’m encouraged by Lonergan's thesis that we humans “can learn and know well,” and that this learning and knowing leads to loving well, which then governs how we act as responsible human beings, aware of our being interconnected. We’re, so to speak, “maturing” our ability to make decisions from our deepest hearts and well-informed intelligence.

RRR: Yes, for Lonergan Dynamism is the process of realizing potential, moving from experience through understanding to judgment and, in the practical order, taking action based on judgment. Desire is what motivates the process, what kick-starts the dynamism. By nature we all desire to know and we all desire to be fulfilled.

JM: I have a juicy quote from the book: “Bernard Lonergan's analysis is to help one understand the inbuilt dynamic of the human subject and so to reach authenticity and self-transcendence. …Authentic human living, then, consists in self-transcendence. Achieving human authenticity is a matter of following the built-in and self-transcending laws of the human spirit.”

MZC: Robert, you have outlined the steps that are included in the process: experiencing, understanding, judging, choosing, and intending to live those joyful values with the zest of a free-flowing life. Say more.

RRR: Insight summarizes Lonergan's three-step program for human cognition (knowing): experiencing, understanding, and judging. There is a fourth step when the subject moves from cognition to volition (choosing): being attentive to experience (experiencing), posing questions in pursuit of understanding those experiences (reflecting), evaluating those understandings (judging), and making decisions or taking action (deciding).

MZC: How does Lonergan get from “Insight” to The Spiritual Exercises? I think that I can see that it will not be hard to locate discernment because of the 4th step, volition or choosing.

JM: Another quote: “The primary role of the Exercises is to foster the dynamism of desire, what Lonergan calls "the eros of the human spirit.” Desire is the most powerful dynamic in any aspect of life—human life or divine. The dynamism of desire is at work in God, not just in us. And the most wonderful moment in our connection with God is when we finally realize that the passion and desiring of God is in fact our own deepest most precious desiring for ourselves. That is the ultimate dynamism of desire! 

GB: I like your focus on one of the points in the book: that religious goals, when they are not corrupted, bring out the best in the human; that there’s an innate human spirituality to be cultivated. And you lifted up the ecumenical aspect of all this, that non-Christian spiritualities move in the same direction.

JM: To quote: “Lonergan's ideas can be helpful to other religions besides Christianity. Today whether one is a Christian or not isn't essential as to the possible efficacy of doing the Exercises.” 

DM: Another way of saying that might be that "seeking of God in all things" is the true impetus of Jesuit spirituality, which is none other than Christian spirituality, and which includes Hindu and Buddhist spiritualities, even if they do not "name" what they seek as we do. 

GB: I would like to return to the idea of desire. I wasn't going to comment on the Dynamism of Desire since I haven’t read the book, and maybe the word "desire" is handled nicely in the book. But there is a further and maybe ultimate stage of getting beyond our personal desires, our "me-drama" of fears and wants to be at peace in the moment, in the now (without getting passive about world suffering). Desire, frequently driven by fear, pitches us toward the future and often becomes excessive (this word is important.... I’m not saying that all desire is bad). Let me illustrate this from the Good Samaritan narrative and some eastern stuff. The Samaritan is plunged into the now of the bleeding guy on the road. He was riding along with sweet thoughts about his girlfriend in Jericho, the candle-lit supper of roast lamb and her soft bed. He doesn't even have a cell phone to call and explain. The “now moment” pulls him out of his "me drama." In Christian language, it's beyond his desires to what is called unselfishness, unconditional care.

DM: Many moons ago, I heard Bernard Lonergan speak at Georgetown, or was it at LMU? He seemed stiff and uncomfortable and delivered his wisdom in a monotone. I never did worship at his altar, although I knew many who underwent the epistemological "conversion" experience that Lonergan's thought seemed to trigger. However, when I read that "achieving human authenticity is ...following the in-built and self-transcending laws of the human spirit,” and the "eros of desire," I am reminded of Karl Rahner's view of man, outlined in "Hoerer des Wortes." Of course, Karl had his followers, too, (I am admittedly one of them)--and he, too, delivered his convoluted German in a monotone. But neither Bernard nor Karl could or would claim to be a prophet. 

GB: I agree with you, Don, about the "sanctifying" well, almost, of old texts like the Exercises, and even the Gospels, as if they had to be beyond critique (any nay-saying) and were always adaptable to any century. I don't hear a word of harder criticism about trying to adapt a 16th century mind to today. I had the same feeling during the 500-year honoring of Ignatius, Xavier and Faber. All fine men, to be sure, but we don't entertain any nay-saying about them on virtually anything. It's like an older habit of holding that Aquinas said it all and better than subsequent philosophers.

DM: Of course, and I assume that you can still do the Exercises without having read or been converted to Lonerganism. This new book, according to some, finally gives us the "key" to what Ignatius really meant. I am skeptical, first, about the "deification" of Ignatius and his writings. I doubt he would claim for himself what we are making of him. He was as limited in perspective and theology as any good man in his century and asking "what Ignatius would do today" is as futile as asking what any of us would do if inserted into 16th century life as a 16th century person? 

JL: I suggest Jesuits or former Jesuits may be the worst judges of Ignatius and his exercises due to the duress of circumstances when we made them or the particular retreat director(s) one had. My unforgettable one was an Alaskan missionary of the Oregon province, (I met many remarkable Alaskan missionaries) who compared the call of Christ the King to the lead sled dogs you depended on to survive in the Arctic.

As for Ignatius and the Exercises, I cannot speak to them without mentioning Bill Meissner, S.J. 's work, Ignatius of Loyola, The Psychology of a Saint, on the psychology of Ignatius and the psychology of the Exercises. Consider the times Ignatius lived through. Consider his spiritual exercises as the work of a layperson. Consider how many unique personal leaders followed him. 

DM: Ignatius's exercises are, to me, sometimes lifted to the level of the New Testament, that is, as a special "latter day revelation of God" good for all times and all peoples, if only their true meaning can be plumbed. 

JL: The Christian test of the Exercises should be whether they lead a person to closer and more joyful service of Christ. I still think the four-week structure of the exercises and the contemplation on love to be works of genius for Inigo. For Inigo, after all, the director of the person making the retreat was the Holy Spirit, as little as that may be apparent to the literalist reading of his text or the rationalists who taught us how to meditate. The Dynamism of Desire. That is clearly the point of the discernment of spirits.

MZC: Thank you all. So I think we can conclude that Lonergan’s work is useful to help us examine the Exercises, and I have to say that most of us still look back into the experience itself rather than a theory. And on that note, I am going to give the last word about spiritual experience, at least for the conversation, to Gene who has a quote from an American Zen master.

GB: This is from Toni Packer's The Silent Question: "What unfolds in awareness is a new, subtle listening that may not ever have been experienced before, because most of the time it has been drowned out by all the other noises (desires/fears) taking place in the bodymind.... Can all the rush of wanting, the silent ambition underneath it, the neediness hiding behind it-- can all of that reveal itself in quiet listening and looking...That is why it's so very important to come to a place of silence, stillness and wondering.... where one can enter into an almost motionless not-knowing." Finally, here's how she describes the now experience: "Awareness replaces thinking and fantasizing about myself with simply being here-- computer humming, keyboard clicking, wind rattling, snowmelt dripping, heart beating, back paining, breathing in and out, in and out -- one moment at a time."

*Lonergan, Bernard, The Dynamism of Desire, Bernard J F. Lonergan, SJ on the Spiritual Exercises of St. Ignatius of Loyola. (The Institute of Jesuit Sources in St. Louis, 2006)

Robert Doran, SJ, has been at the forefront of publishing Lonergan's Collected Works. You can view his web site, or register and dive into the seas charted by Lonergan at 

http://www.bernardlonergan.com.

Boston College’s Lonergan Institute: http://www.bc.edu/bc_org/avp/cas/lonergan/institute/about_institute.html

Begin with a Joke

My friend and mentor, Jon Logan, gave me some wise and generous advice, advice that Issan would have seconded: “Always start with a joke.”

So here goes.

One bright afternoon, Isaan was walking down Hartford St. towards 18th with Steve Allen and Jerry Berg. They were headed to the hamburger place that used to be close to the corner right next to Moby Dick’s. That information might not be important unless you want to know if Issan loved hamburgers—he did—but you have to know that Steve is a Zen priest, one of Issan’s closest friends, his dharma heir, and the first Executive Director of Maitri Home and Hospice. Jerry Berg was a successful lawyer and prominent leader in the gay community, and an early supporter of the hospice.

As they walked, Steve and Jerry were discussing possible legal structures for the hospice, while Issan lagged a few steps behind. He noticed a bottle lying on the sidewalk and bent to pick it up. Yes, any rumors that he was an incarnation of Mr. (or Miss.) Clean is well-founded. But when he noticed that the bottle was rather beautiful and might be worth keeping, he took out the rag that he kept neatly folded in his monk’s handbag, and began to polish it. Suddenly, a Genie appeared! A Buddhist Genie, a Bodhidharma look-a-like, with a shaved head, droopy ears, and a bright robe. The Genie looked at Issan, and Issan looked back, a staring match of wonderment. Steve and Jerry turned around to see what Issan was holding. Issan was holding up, and they stopped dead in their tracks.

The Genie spoke the time-honored script of genies: “Because you have freed me after many lifetimes of being cramped up in that god-damned bottle, you, yeah, I guess all three of you, get one wish. It’s just one, so you’d better make it good.”

Steve didn’t hesitate: he knew his Buddhism and asked to be released from his karma and enter Buddhahood, or nirvana, or the Pure Land, right there and then. Just as he was about to raise his palms in gassho, the traditional gesture of respect—poof, he was gone.

Jerry thought to himself, "That’s powerful magic. I’m going for it. I’m not getting any younger, so how about a great life in a heaven modeled after Palm Springs—but without the humidity—endless pool parties, rafts of handsome men, and an eternal nosh that never made you fat? As he smiled and waved goodbye—poof, he disappeared too.

The Genie turned to Issan, who was left standing alone—it might have been wonderment on his face, maybe just a bit puzzled. The Genie said, "OK, honey, it's your turn. What does your little heart desire?

Issan didn’t hesitate, “Get those two numb-nut girls back here. We have a hospice to run.”