Acts of Liberation

"We must not discriminate." -- Cultivating the Mind of Love by Thich Nhat Hanh

Writing on the Ultimate Dimension, Buddhist monk and teacher Thich Nhat Hanh points out in this book, Cultivating the Mind of Love, that there is a moment when, for each of us, we wake up to the moment, just this moment. We feel alive and vibrant.
 He writes about French author, Albert Camus who wrote in his novel, L' Etranger, that Mersault, in prison, condemned to die in three days, for the very first time, notices the blue sky. It was a sudden opening, a moment of mindfulness; he realized that he had spent a lot of time, as people sometimes do, feeling frustrated, imprisoned by anger, lust, or by notions that peace and happiness are out there, somewhere, sometime.
At that moment he saw, really saw the blue sky for the first time, it was a revelation to him. Life did have meaning; there were things that mattered to him. He could live his short time remaining deliberately, with awareness of sun and sky. His seeing deeply made his life real; it became his true life.

Hanh notes that many persons walk about in their daily lives as though they were dead, not noticing much or allowing the world close enough to be touched. He insists that these persons must be helped to realize that they matter; this realization is an act of liberation.
The Christian faith teaches that the Christ wears many different clothing; he has many disguises. Often others fail to recognize him in the sick, the poor or the lame. For Mersault God comes to rescue him with a sudden, burning realization of the beauty of Creation in the form of a blue sky. Anything might bring us to awareness of the Avatamsaka realm, we may wake up to this moment, just this moment and see the beauty and peace of it all. "We must not discriminate," Hanh insists.

Live Like the Dead

"Without true mindfulness, we live like the dead."  --True love: A Practice for Awakening the Heart by Thich Nhat Hanh

"Through the voice of the Holy Spirit you come alive again. Mindfulness is moment to moment, every moment. Being alive is being in the present moment, this moment. When we practice deep looking, mindfulness, we receive help, understanding. "Mindfulness brings concentration, understanding, love and freedom," writes Hanh in his book, True love: A Practice for Awakening the Heart by Thich Nhat Hanh. 

Buddhist monk and teacher, Hanh further expresses his understanding about the Holy Spirit; he says, "if you are a Christian, you could say that this energy [mindfulness] we are talking about is known as the Holy Spirit, the energy that is sent to us by God. Wherever this energy exists, there is attention, compassion, understanding and love. And this energy has the power to heal. Since Jesus embodies this energy, he has the energy to heal whoever he touches. When Jesus heals people, he heals them with the power of the Holy Spirit."

Hanh notes that it may be said that healing occurs as the establishment of the energies of compassion and love. Mindfulness is the energy that makes it possible "for us to be aware of what's happening in the present moment." Thus without mindfulness in this view, we live like the dead. "Through the Holy Spirit you come to life again every moment."

In the modern world, many seek to live with and in the Spirit. For most, it's not easy. Author Richard Hauser S.J. writes, " Rather than respond to the Spirit, we find ourselves responding to these [other] pressures. We don't have to be convinced of the pressures towards evil within ourselves. Daily we experience our self-centered [dream] drives for popularity, money, power, prestige, and pleasure; these can dominate our lives in very obvious and in very subtle ways, blocking our responsiveness to the Spirit... We see happiness as coming primarily from fulfilling our personal needs and desires as much as possible. This self-centered orientation puts us in conflict with other individuals, communities, and nations; any of these which threatens, becomes an enemy to us, as persons or as nations." para. 

These pressures can motivate our lives in a direction opposed to the energy of the Holy Spirit. A solution for practice is to build a daily lifestyle that fosters the Holy Spirit and the mindfulness for living. We must consider the ways in which our talents and gifts may be put to use to heed the calling of the Spirit; How are we called to love and to serve? In the Gospels, Paul gives a list of the qualities that are signs of the Spirit's presence: love, joy, peacefulness, patience, goodness, kindness, trustfulness, self-control, and gentleness. The Spirit's absence is indicated by: feuds, wrangling, jealousy, bad temper, quarrels, disagreements, factions, and envy.

Becoming Alive, the Kingdom of Happiness

"This is the practice of living deeply in the moment. If you worry too much, you will suffer." --Going Home by Thich Nhat Hanh

Know that, says Thich Nhat Hanh, "the Kingdom [of heaven] is not for tomorrow, the Kingdom is not a matter of the past. The Kingdom is now. We need food today... We need to be alive in each moment. We need the kind of food that makes us alive in every moment of our life so that we can nourish our faith, our love, our solidity, and our tolerance. We desperately need that kind of food." There are so many hungry people, people hungry for spiritual food.
We grasp ideas and notions "that is why we have never satisfied our hunger. We always speak of eating, but we never eat."

"If the Christ is the body of God, which he is, then the bread he offers is also the body of the Cosmos. Look deeply and you will notice the sun, the earth in the bread."
Being mindful will allow you to see all that the bread contains; consuming this bread, "you eat it in such a way that you become alive, truly alive... Eat in such a way that the Holy Spirit becomes an energy within you.. and then [it] will stop being an idea, a notion."

You need to eat this bread, corn, rice, what ever it may be, mindfully so as to become alive to the Way, to the process.
Artists often talk of 'process.' What is your process? What is your attachment to the outcome?
Mindfully observe the ways in which you consume the 'bread of life.'
"You need to eat it in order to become alive again so that faith as an energy, true faith, true love, is nourished in you, and happiness becomes a reality for yourself and for many others."

Yet because of all that what is written above, in complete faith and hopefulness, you imagine a kingdom that is without suffering at all. "It is very distressing,' writes Hanh.
 He observes that the joy to be alive can most clearly come about from the despair of dying; the joy of health is not complete without the knowledge and experience of sickness and loss of health.
Hanh states, "Our hope, our desire, our aspiration for a kingdom or a place where suffering does not exist should be re-examined."  That the people in that place should not suffer, they will not despair; they should only experience happiness, unending in their daily life -- Wake Up!
"This is something absurd and impossible," Hanh writes. Rather a "Pure Land" is a place where both suffering and love exist. It is a place of mindfulness, and of impermanence so that the good may follow the ill. It is Hell to merely suffer without any hope for relief.

Love is born of suffering. Suffering is its ground. If you live in such a place that is without suffering, then you live in a place without love.
We all need food to sustain ourselves, but not just any kind of food. The right food for each of us is not always the same food.
You who have suffered, know what it is; you want to help others in their suffering; to bring them the food they need. You want to bring happiness, your happiness; this is the stuff of love; it is compassion. Love born of suffering is a practice.
"Unless you know what suffering is, you are not motivated to practice compassion, love and understanding."

The Light That Reveals: I Am There for You.

"...the energy of the Holy Spirit is in us, we are truly alive." --Thich Nhat Hanh

Buddhist monk and teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh, intimately familiar with spiritual traditions beyond his own, from both study and long experience, writes competently in his book Living Buddha, Living Christ, about the indwelling, or incarnation of the Spirit within the Christ.

He writes in the essay The Light That Reveals, "When John the Baptist helped Jesus touch the Holy Spirit, the heavens opened and the Holy Spirit descended like a dove, and entered the person of Jesus." When mindfulness is born in us, we need to continue to practice. "Children have little difficulty recognizing the presence of the Holy Spirit. "When the Spirit is in us, we are truly alive, in love with life itself; capable of understanding, we desire to be of help and service to others.

Approaching God through the Holy Spirit "seems to be a safer way to approach the [Holy] Trinity." When the Spirit rests within, we are "living mindfully, touching the light of our awareness in everything we do, we touch the Buddha, and our mindfulness grows."

"I am There For You," writes Hanh. "The most precious gift we can offer to others is our [simple] presence. When our mindfulness embraces those we love... they bloom like flowers. If you love... and rarely make yourself available... that is not true love... Mindfulness relieves suffering, anxiety and worries... by doing that, you already offer some relief. Mindfulness is filled with understanding and compassion.

When you are really there, the energy of the Holy Spirit is in you." In Hanh's words, the Holy [whole, unified, One] Spirit is very much about mindfulness; both help us to touch the ultimate dimension of reality.