Loori's "Bringing the Sacred to Life"

Loon Lake 2012 - Laura Anderson

We receive this food in gratitude to all beings
Who have helped bring it to our table
And vow to respond in turn to those in need
With wisdom and compassion.
                                  - Short Meal Gatha (Grace (66)

• "Books contain dead teaching. Live teaching comes from living people and (sic) who then transmit it to living people." (9)
• "In bringing our hands together in gassho, we take an idea and turn it into action.  When you make something an action int becomes clarified and concrete.  We gassho before entering the zendo, before accepting food, and as we greet one another; with each gassho we identify with the place, the object the person.  We acknowledge in our action the fact that all the dualities come together to create one reality." (14)
• When the self is forgotten, only the ten thousand things remain.  Everything is realised as nothing but yourself.  Compassion, then, is nothing but taking good care of yourself." (15)
• "You have to see, sooner or later, that it all comes down to you. . . . What you do and what happens to you are the same thing.  Realise that fully, and there is no way you can avoid taking responsibility.  And when you take responsibility, you can empower yourself; you bring freedom home.  You can no longer blame.  You can no longer say, "He made me angry." because only you can make you angry." (46)
• Discipline is different from rigidity. (59)
• "If it's not present in your mind, your mouth chants empty words".  Chanting, like invoking, means call to mind.  Chanting and invoking have to do with thought and not with language." Chanting comes from what you do with your mind, not with the word. (109)

Works Cited: 
Loori, John Daido. Bringing the Sacred to Life:  The Daily Practice of Zen Ritual. Boston: Shambhala. 2008. Print.