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“Buddhism III- UU’s and the Buddha” third of a sermon series
Rev. Brian J. Kiely Unitarian Church of Edmonton, Feb. 17, 2008
It would not be too grand an overstatement to say that Buddhism came to North America because of Unitarians. It would be a bit of an overstatement, of course, but not too much of one. The first Buddhists on this continent were no doubt the Asian fishermen and imported labourers who brought their religious traditions with them. By and large those traditions remained within their community, something deeply mysterious and perplexing to the western Christians that employed them and exploited them, but who seldom sought to learn much about them.
It wasn’t until 1844, in fact, that the first English translation of a Buddhist text was published. Unitarian writer Elizabeth Palmer Peabody had it printed in Dial magazine, the publication of the Boston transcendentalist Unitarians. I spoke of them in my sermon on Emerson and spirituality a few weeks ago. Her translation of a chapter of the Saddharamapundarika-sutra was the first public expression of interest in Buddhism in Western literature.
Rev. James Ishmael Ford writes, “Since that time Unitarians and now Unitarian Universalists have continued to find Buddhism intriguing. At the beginning this interest was romantic and generally ill-informed. But over the years both interest and knowledge have deepened and broadened.”
The Transcendentalists were shifting away from a dependence on Scripture towards a faith mostly centered on human experience and human intuition. Buddhism spoke to both those aspects. First, it was a non-Christian faith and so outside the bounds of Scripture. The fact that Buddhism is not constructed on any concept of God per se, made exploration easier. There was nothing for a liberal Christian to reject as they explore this tantalizing new form of spirituality. 19th century Unitarians could maintain their relationship with the God they understood and still draw support from a Buddhist practice which doesn’t much care one way or another about the divine. There was no tension, no disconnect. Ford called early interest, ‘romantic and ill-informed’. He noted, for example, how the 19th century Unitarian writer Lydia Maria Child described the Buddha incorrectly as a “heavenly spirit”. Says Ford drily, “Most Buddhists would not choose this term.” The Buddha was a man who achieved enlightenment, but was still entirely a man.
Secondly, Buddhism became attractive because it was so self-contained. Although the Buddha believed in the importance of a priesthood community called the Sangha, the priests seldom had the same direct congregational authority of western clergy. At the end of the day, each person’s quest for Enlightenment remained deeply personal. Unitarians found that attractive and in line with their own goals. Ralph Waldo Emerson spoke of the Oversoul, a kind of river of energy through which we could all connect with the divine. The Buddhist concept of meditation as a path to Enlightened consciousness is similar enough that we Unitarians found, if not a common answer, at least a fellow traveller.
Unitarians back then liked that. We still do. We don’t much like people telling us what or how to believe. We would rather find out for ourselves. The lack of dogma is attractive...as the bumper sticker says, “My karma ran over my dogma.”
At the same time Buddhism describes an inward journey. There is no ritual in early Buddhism. (It must be said that some expressions of Buddhism around the world did become highly ritualized, but that this is not the norm.) The Transcendentalists loved this inward journey aspect. Their sense of connection to the divine most often came with the natural world. In recent decades that aspect of Unitarian theology has again become dominant in our church. When I ask people today, both Unitarian and not, to describe their peak spiritual moments, they most often describe intense feelings of connection with the nature and the wild.
I recently participated in a discussion with western Canadian Unitarian ministers. We were asked to define the term “eco-spirituality”. Here are two answers that drew a lot of affirming nods:
Lifelong hiker and mountain climber Phillip Hewett of Vancouver said, “Spirituality is about connectedness, feeling not alone in the world. Add ‘eco’ to that then we can feel deep connection in our being part of the world around us.”
Wendy McNiven, currently serving in Kamloops said, “I have a personal sense of some energy force, perhaps a golden thread...that is everything, part of everything.” For her, that sense of the spiritual connection shapes both her theology and her ethical actions, “Having an awareness of that thread means that I must act a certain way. There are implications to believing in that connection.”
We can see in these contemporary words, the echoes of Transcendentalism, and so too can we see the potential point of contact still exists between Unitarian Universalists and Buddhists.
According to James Ford there was one other earlier connection as well. In the 1930s and beyond, Humanism became an important force in Unitarianism. It remains a significant influence even today in this age of rediscovered spirituality. The Humanists believed that God is not a being per se with any direct influence in our lives. So what could they find in the spiritual path of Buddhism that was attractive?
Again it was the draw of an ancient faith that did not depend on God. Unitarian humanist Richard Romig wrote in “Reasonable Religion”, “Even though the Buddha believed life’s highest goal is to break the cycle of birth and rebirth and end one’s existence (that may sound bewildering and pessimistic to a westerner), many of his teachings and proverbs hold a rich meaning for us. For example, Buddha said, ‘All that we are is a result of what we have thought. It is founded on our thoughts and made up of our thoughts.’”
Humanists tend to hold that we can only rely on ourselves and our fellow beings. Our development, the fulfilment of our potential rests with us alone. “We are the result of what we have thought,” matches well with Humanist views on the intellect.
By the 1950’s Unitarians were developing a more realistic and grounded understanding of Buddhism. In fact one of my teachers, George Marshall, wrote one of the most prominent western biographies called, “Buddha: The Quest for Serenity”.
Today, about 2 per cent of UU’s in North America list Buddhism as their primary spiritual influence. However a visit to UU Buddhist website leads me to conclude that a great many more of us consider Buddhism directly or indirectly as an influence in our spiritual lives. I suspect that’s because our faith has no definable spiritual practice of its own. We have, over the years, borrowed from various traditions, often adapting them to our own uses. We need look no farther than our hymnbook. There we can find music from Hindu, Islamic, Jewish, Christian and Buddhist traditions. We can find words celebrating First Nation, Hispanic and African American traditions.
How does Buddhism touch us today? Well at that same minister’s retreat I mentioned a few moments ago, we had a chalice, but we also had a Buddhist singing bowl. In our days together we traditionally have brief morning and evening worship services. Most featured silent meditation – one a walking meditation- which involve the emptying of the self. We often focused on the sound of a Buddhist bell, or the sound of raindrops (yes, raindrops - did I mention it was in Vancouver?) for the purpose of emptying the mind and allowing for the still small voice within, the voice of some mind of intuitive enlightenment, to come in as a welcome guest. That’s a Buddhist influence.
In Kenya this week’s Leadership Conference participants were put into covenant groups, the same as the small group ministry circles we were doing here a couple of years ago. In those sessions we spent considerable time meditating on particular questions, seeking that still small voice within. Perhaps that is Buddhist influence, perhaps it is merely a western adaptation that is similar to Buddhism, but however derived, the parallel remains.
There is a danger in this, of course. We must be wary of borrowing without understanding and borrowing without respect. We risk becoming spiritual dilettantes, trying some new form of meditation or practice simply because it’s new. The concern here is that we have been accused of being a church of flitters who never discover the depth of any one thing, or make a commitment to any one practice. I believe it’s a valid concern.
On the other hand, James Ford also points out that Unitarian Universalism has become attractive for western Buddhists who need something more than the Sangha has to offer.
Number one on that list is religious education for children. “Many Buddhist centres do not have religious education programs – lack of resources, lack of priority, lack of parents in leadership.” Ford recounts how one prominent Buddhist leader in the US recommends UU churches to parents seeking religious education for their children.
The second is our humanist tradition. The west is a rational place, sometimes too much so. But let us be careful not to throw out the good with the bad. Humanism has taught us to attend to science, to accept the physical realities of our world and the Laws of Nature. It is not, in fact, all an illusion. There are ways of developing and maintaining physical well being and reducing human suffering that are based on science, on research and on technology. We have the ability to grow the soul with art and music. All of these are gifts Humanism has helped us recognize. Western Buddhists grew up with an appreciation of reason and science. UUism is a place where they can acknowledge that, and yet be free to pursue their Buddhist spiritual practices.
Third is our social justice tradition. Economic, environmental and racial justice are often concerns for Buddhists. The violently suppressed protests of monks seeking democracy in Myanmar is one example. Continuing concern for exile of the Dalai Llama is another. Unitarian Universalists have a long tradition of pursuing social justice. It is enshrined in four of our Principles where we first affirm justice, equity and compassion, secondly lift up the pursuit of the democratic process thirdly advocate for a global community and finally note our participation in the interdependent web of all existence. In a religion often seen as passive and distanced from the world, our justice-seeking history is attractive for westerners unwilling to sit completely on the sidelines.
All this suggests that western Buddhists are attracted to UUism because it allows them to reconnect with their western roots. Those of us raised in North America are the products of a system of thought and values that is part Christian and part humanist, that is capitalistic and yet still tinged with the optimism of the Enlightenment . These forces and ideas shape our social structures and realities. Buddhism brings into that a deeply powerful spiritual practice, but one that comes from another culture foreign to us. For many, Unitarian Universalism provides a comfortable balance of eastern spirituality and western idealism. I believe the friendly relations begun 150 years ago will continue for some time to come.
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