This was an old thread on NCR Cafe, before my time, that generated a very small but interesting discussion. I personally found the post and the comments intriguiging enough that I will read the book as soon as I can get it from the library. Given what I read on the thread, and the events that are unfolding around us now, it occurred to me that perhaps it is time now for a revisit to the topic. A couple of paragraphs from the thread:
"I was talking with a Chinese Zen master once and he said one of the difficulties of dealing with Catholics is that they love their spiritualities ... as if it was a parallel life," Kennedy tells Tom Fox. Buddhists root us in this moment, he said. "Buddhists would say, 'If God isn't present in this moment, where is he? You meet God in doing the deed of this moment in front of you. Never withdraw from it.' "
When Kennedy went to study with a Japanese Zen master, the Buddhist told him: " 'I do not want to make you a Buddhist. I want to empty you in imitation of your Lord Jesus Christ who emptied himself and poured himself out.' This is at the heart of what it means to be Catholic. To follow Christ is to empty ourselves." He continues: "I remember thinking then, 'This Buddhist might make a Christian of me yet.' It was so profoundly Christian and beautiful."
That we could learn what it really means to be Christian and Catholic from someone who is neither a Christian or a Catholic, but rather from a culture that traditional Christianity considers to be pagan idolators destined to spend eternity burning in the eternal fires of damnation ... is such a delicious irony.
Carl
PS: Wouldn't it be an interesting twist, if the world financial crisis and the fallout from the US Presidential election ended up bankrupting Opus Dei and the Vatican?
PPS: A "MUST READ" bulletin from Neale Donald Walsh :
