EcoSangha Seattle

• Home
• What is EcoSangha
• Schedule
• Links

Schedule for Seattle EcoSangha

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The 2009-2010 EcoSangha program will commence with our first sitting on Thursday, October 1, at 7:30 P.M. in the Chapel of St. Ignatius on the Seattle University campus.


We are planning an exciting year, with meditation on Thursday evenings at 7:30 P.M. and the once-a-month lectures on Tuesdays. In additiion, there will be a two-day conference on Buddhism and Ecology (see below), and an all-day sesshin. Stay tuned to this space.


This is the schedule for EcoSangha lectures and special events at Seattle University so far:

PRELIMINARY CONFERENCE SCHEDULE

Friday evening, May 7

Location: Wycoff Auditorium (Engineering Building)

6:50 PM Brief Welcome, Dr. Sharon Suh, Seattle University Religious Studies Department, and Dr. Jason M. Wirth, Seattle University Philosophy Department.

7:00 - 8:00 PM Reverend Don Castro, Seattle Betsuin
Title: What is EcoSangha?

Rev. Castro will lecture on the origin, doctrinal basis, and hopes of the EcoSangha. He asserts that being a Buddhist automatically makes one a "cosmic ecologist" and a conservationist. At this time of environmental crisis, inter-religious and inter-denominational Buddhist cooperation and activism is urgently needed.

8:00 - 9:00 PM Dr. David Loy, Besl Family Chair Professor of Ethics/Religion and Society, Xavier University, Cincinnati, Ohio
Title: Healing Ecology: A Buddhist Perspective on the Eco-Crisis.

Does Buddhism offer any special perspective on the ecological crisis? Do its teachings imply a different way of understanding the biosphere, and our relationship to it, at this critical time when we seem to be doing our utmost to destroy it? There are profound parallels between our individual predicament, as Buddhism understands it, and our collective situation today in relation to the earth. This implies that the eco-crisis is as much a spiritual challenge as a technological one.

Saturday, May 8

Location: Pigott Auditorium (Pigott Building)

9:50 AM Brief Welcome, Bill Hirsch, White Cloud Buddhist Society, and Dr. Elizabeth Sikes, Seattle University Philosophy Department.

10:00 AM - 11:00 AM Dr. Vishaka Smith, Theravada Buddhist practitioner, environmental engineer.
Title: Ecological Karma

"Over 2500 years ago, the Buddha realized for himself and taught us that one of the laws governing this world is that if we harm ourselves or others it will create unease and harm within us. Similarly, if we use thoughts, actions, and words with a lot of care it will benefit ourselves and others. It might not happen overnight but it's going to happen for sure.

Our environment includes not only animals and trees but also people with whom we interact. The basic five percepts recommended by Buddha help get started on living a non-harmful life. Precepts help to create and enjoy a safe environment for ourselves and others. Even if we only consider our environment it makes sense to know that if we abuse the environment we are going to be destroyed eventually."

11:00 AM - 11:45 AM Naomi Kasumi, Seattle University Department of Fine Arts, Artists Talk (to accompany exhibition)

"My art explores and addresses the concept of "presence & absence""memory/memorial" and testimony related to my experience of having an abortion in 1998. These themes have become powerful ones for me. They have been the primary focus of my work for the past nine years.

Coming from Japan, my cultural background and perspective is different from Americans. In my hometown, while abortion has been legalized, it is still considered extremely taboo. Abortion is surrounded by guilt and shame. It must be kept secret and hidden.

Since my experience in 1998, I have been making handmade objects spontaneously, and obsessively. This ritual seems timeless. These objects reflect my personal struggle to come to terms with the feelings of grief, anguish, sadness, loss, confusion, and depression.

In a series of memorial projects entitled MEM: memory memorial, stripped of political sloganeering, I attempt to articulate my story and bring a rich and honest forum in which I am able to speak about the unspeakable. I am hoping that my art allows voices so long silent to begin healing conversations."

11:45 AM - 12:45 PM LUNCH

12:45 PM - 1:45 PM Dr. Mark Unno, University of Oregon Department of Religious Studies
Title: Climate Change: A Karmic Revolution

"The current responses to climate change and related environmental concerns including resource depletion and peak oil have predominantly taken the form of fight or flight. That is, many people tend either to insist that we are going to solve the problems now, or to ignore the problems because they seem so overwhelming. In this presentation, I will examine the practical external problems we face in light of the moral and religious consciousness of karma. Placing the current problems within the larger trajectory of the development of human civilization as well as questions of human desire and karmic consequences, I will propose that a shift in our frame of reference will help us to work towards a karmic revolution."


1:45 PM - 2:45 PM Reverend Kosho Itagaki, Northwest Zen Community
Title: The Soto Zen Tradition and Ecology

This will be an approach to ecology from the viewpoint of the Soto Zen tradition, founded in Japan by Dogen Zenji in the Thirteenth Century. It will explore the manner in which Dogen articulated harmony with nature.

2:45 - 3:15 PM BREAK

3:15 PM - 4:15 PM Tyler Dewar, Nalandabodhi and the Nitartha Institute
Title: Green Dreams: Emptiness and Aspiration in Mahayana Buddhism.

"My talk will aim to become a little bit of spiritual nourishment for those working for the environment. It will discuss how Buddhism sees emptiness as the doorway to possibility, and how aspirations can become a powerful force for nourishing the heart as well as maintaining fearless hope with regard to the future. I will conclude my talk by singing a song written by the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa titled 'An aspiration for the World.'"

4:15 - 5:15 PM Dr. Saheed Adejumobi, Global African Studies, Seattle University
Title: Power Relations and the Ecologies of Freedom

The presentation will reflect on the interface between power relations, modernity and the African subject. It analyzes the significance of physical and social environments in both national and transnational contexts. Freedom is defined as the dignity of labor rooted in a more valuable relationship to the earth, time and history.

5:15 - 6:15 PM Margaret Pikarsky, Bee Heaven Farm, Florida
Title: Organic Farming and Community-Supported Agriculture

Mrs. Pikarsky, one of the pioneers of community-supported agriculture in south Florida, will talk will talk about the interrelationship and interdependence relationships of her farm and its place in the fragile south Florida ecosystem.

6:30 PM Reception

BIOS

Saheed Adejumobi, an historian, is Associate Professor in the Global African Studies Program. He has degrees from University of Lagos, University of Oregon, and the University of Texas at Austin, where he was awarded his Ph.D. He has taught at the University of Texas at Austin and Wayne State University, Detroit, Michigan. He specializes in African and African American History, and African Diaspora intellectual and cultural traditions. He is the author of numerous articles, as well as the book, The History of Ethiopia, Greenwood History of Modern Nations Series (Greenwood Press, 2007). He is currently at work on a book entitled, Social Reform in the Age of Decolonization: Modernity and the Transformation of Politics in Western Nigeria.

Rev. Don Castro was born in San Jose, California, and received a B.A. in Anthropology from San Jose State University. After receiving a M.A. in Buddhist Studies from the Institute of Buddhist Studies in Berkeley in 1975, Rev. Castro studied in Japan where he was ordained in the Jodo Shinshu tradition of Japanese Buddhism. He began his ministry with the Buddhist Churches of America in 1977, and has served at the Seattle Betsuin Buddhist Church since 1986. His interest and presentation of Buddhism as an inherently ecological and conservation-oriented religion began with his graduate studies at IBS.

Tyler Dewar is a senior teacher at Nalandabodhi (www.nalandabodhi.org), an international Buddhist community founded by his teacher, Dzogchen Ponlop Rinpoche. An oral and literary translator of Tibetan, Tyler also serves on the faculty of Nitartha Institute (www.nitarthainstitute.org). He works full time as a translator and lives in Seattle with his wife and daughter.

Bill Hirsch (Xiaobaiyun) has been a practicing Buddhist for 46 years, and is one of the founding members of EcoSangha Seattle. In 1964 he took the vows of a Theravada monk in Thailand, and in 1990 he was ordained as a priest in the White Cloud Buddhist Society, a Chinese Hua Yen/Pure Land tradition dating back to the Song Dynasty. Most recently, he received initiation in the Mat Giao Vietnamese Buddhist school. Bill is Secretary of the Northwest Dharma Association, and a member of the Board of Trustees of the Maitreya Charity.

Rev. Kosho Itagaki is a certified first class teacher of the Japanese Soto Zen tradition. Prior to coming to the Seattle area, he worked as a Soto Zen missionary on the island of Kauai in the state of Hawaii. He is the Dharma successor to Rev. Dosho Saikawa, who is presently acting as the chief director of the South American Soto Mission. He is presently the Operating director of the Northwest Zen Community, Zensho-ji, and he is a chief priest at the Soken-ji Zen Temple in Japan. He is the former chief priest of Kauai Soto Zen temple (Zenshuji) in Hawaii. He is an ex-resident priest of Hoon-ji Soto Zen Monastery as well as an ex-resident priest of Saijo-ji Soto Zen Monastery, both in Japan.

Naomi Kasumi was born and raised in Kyoto, Japan. She graduated from Bukkyo University with BA in Sociology. After graduating, she became a professional cross country Ski racer in Japan. She came to the United States to study English and Art in 1995. She graduated with a MFA Degree from the University of Oregon in 2002. She is currently an associate professor of Fine Arts, the Director of Digital Design program, the Director of the Siena (Fine Arts Study Abroad) program, as well as the director of the Kinsey/Vachon galleries. Kasumi's current work, the MEM project, is about an issue of her personal experience in the past. She is a very prolific installation artist and has had extensive solo and group exhibitions nationally and internationally.

David R. Loy is Besl Professor of Ethics/Religion and Society at Xavier University in Cincinnati, Ohio. His work is primarily in comparative philosophy and religion, particularly comparing Buddhist with modern Western thought. His books include Nonduality: A Study in Comparative Philosophy; Lack and Transcendence: The Problem of Death and Life in Psychotherapy, Existentialism and Buddhism; A Buddhist History of the West: Studies in Lack; The Great Awakening: A Buddhist Social Theory; Money, Sex, War, Karma: Notes for a Buddhist Revolution; Awareness Bound and Unbound: Buddhist Essays; and The World Is Made of Stories (forthcoming). He is co-editor of A Buddhist Response to the Climate Emergency (2009). A Zen practitioner for many years, he is qualified as a teacher in the Sanbo Kyodan tradition of Japanese Buddhism.

Margaret Pikarsky holds a BS in Biology, AB in Psychology and an MS in Management Science/Systems Analysis from the University of Miami. After a 25-year detour working in IT at the University of Miami Miller School of Medicine, she quit to farm full-time, and hasn't looked back. Bee Heaven Farm is a 5-acre, diversified, family farm located in the heart of the rapidly diminishing Redland agricultural area of Miami-Dade County, Florida. Margie runs the farm together with her husband, daughter, two employees and various apprentices, interns and volunteers. First certified in 1997 by QCS/FOG, Bee Heaven Farm grows avocados and other tropical fruit, herbs, vegetables, and edible flowers and produces certified organic eggs and raw (uncertified) honey for local consumption. Bee Heaven Farm runs a 450-plus-member tri-county Community-Supported Agriculture farm membership program and sells at local farmers markets. BHF also supplies other select businesses in the South Florida area.

Elizabeth Sikes is a lecturer in philosophy at Seattle University and an ordained Buddhist priest in the White Cloud order. She co-directs the Seattle University EcoSangha. Her interests revolve around ecological philosophy, psychology, and aesthetics. She is especially interested in the kinds of experiences and practices, like meditation, that connect the human being more intrinsically with nature and thus facilitate the possibility of deep change in thought patterns destructive of the earth and self. She is currently at work on a book manuscript entitled, The Evolutionary Task of the Poet.

Dr. Vishaka Smith is a Registered Professional Civil Engineer originally from Sri Lanka. She contributes her technical and non-technical skills in a wide variety of fields. Vishaka is passionate about protecting environmental and human health, and so developed a methodology to control urban nonpoint source pollution, for which she received her Ph.D. in Environmental Policy and Management from the University of New Orleans. Currently, she is trained as a Carbon Coach by the city of Seattle to support resource conservation efforts in the community, and is working with United Indians of All Tribes Foundations to move forward on green initiatives. She has been practicing meditation since a young adult and has attended over 14 residential retreats over 9 days long, and one of 28 days. She offers a class on Mindfulness and Nonviolent Communication (NVC) sponsored by the Freedom Project (www.freedom-project.org). Please see her website www.vishakasmith.org for more details.


Sharon A. Suh is the Director of the Academic Salons program and Associate Professor of World Religions at Seattle University. She currently teaches courses in Buddhism, Buddhism and Film, Buddhism and Gender, and World Religions. Her research specialization includes women in Buddhism, Buddhism in America, Asian American religions and Buddhism and film. She received her Ph.D. in Buddhist Studies from Harvard University in 2000 and is the author of Being Buddhist in a Christian World: Gender and Community in a Korean American Temple, published by the University of Washington Press in 2004. Prior to moving to Seattle in 2000, Suh worked as the Executive Director of the Korean American Museum in Los Angeles and as a researcher for the Center for Religion and Civic Culture at the University of Southern California. She currently serves as special advisor and research consultant for the Institute for Signifying Scriptures at Claremont Graduate School, and serves on the Wing Luke Asian Museum's New Dialogues Initiative on Faith & Spirituality Community Advisory Committee.

Note: The Sangha meets for meditation each Thursday evening throughout the school year, usually at 7:30 P.M., in the Chapel of St. Ignatius, on the Seattle University campus. Once a month, on Tuesday nights, there will be lectures on Buddhist/Environmental subjects. For further information on these events, please e-mail Dr. Jason Wirth at wirthj@seattleu.edu. Please be sure that Dr. Wirth has your e-mail address so you can stay current on schedule changes.

All sittings and lectures are open to the public without charge. Please feel welcome to join us.