Manchester Zen Peacemakers Zen training group is launched!

In addition to the regular vibrant Zen Peacemaker Circle, Genki suggested that we have a Manchester Zen training group also. So after much discussion and thought, we are launching the Great Heart Experimental Zendo! It will initially be a roving Zendo, taking place each week in different people's homes, until we need to find a more permanent place to hire...

Here is the mission statement:

Manchester Great Heart Experimental Zendo:

Socially Engaged Buddhism and Training in the Zen Peacemakers Tradition


Zen is a powerful training for coming to experience our oneness and interconnectedness with the whole of life. Beyond the vision, there is the challenge of embodying it and living it out as compassionate service to all beings.

The Great Heart Zendo is an experiment, daring to see what tools and inspirations the Buddhist heritage has to offer us today. Can Zen meditation help us experience life more fully and completely? Can meditation on kindness and compassion break down our stubbornness and make us more dynamic, effective helpers? What is there for us in the philosophy, the sacred texts, the symbols, sounds and images? How can we make it work for us here and now? We will fearlessly explore, experiment and discover deeper insights into wholeness. We will develop skills to heal our own lives and the lives of those we share this world with.

We are a member of the Zen Peacemakers Sangha (www.zenpeacemakers.org), an international family of Zen and multi-faith communities inspired by Roshi Bernie Glassman, pioneering Zen master in the Japanese tradition and founder of many successful socially-engaged enterprises. The core of our training will be regular Zazen meditation, passed down heart-to-heart for centuries, together with the study of Bernie’s teaching, his Japanese teachers and his Western students. Beyond this, we will delve deeply into many aspects of Buddhist practice, and invite guest teachers from other religions, scientists, artists, social activists. We will not be bound by tradition, but will plunge headfirst into whatever arises as a path to follow- sharing in the joys and sufferings of the world, dancing, crying, fooling about, recognising our unbreakable kinship with everyone and everything.

Our symbol is the staff of Jizo Bodhisattva, seen in Japan and China as the guardian of beings suffering in hell. Jizo also protects the vulnerable, those discarded by society, children, prostitutes, travellers… going where help is needed with no hesitation or regret.

We’re starting now with weekly meetings in Newton Heath- if you’re interested in coming along, wherever you’re from and whatever your background, call Zangtsal Starbuck on 0797 2152148 or email greatheartzendo@googlemail.com. Come and help us make this work, find your own strength and put it to work in service of those in need!