The weekend came and went as did very many guests. One person described the gathering on Sunday as a huge block of gratitude. We had gathered together to celebrate the tenth anniversary memorial for Rev. Master Jiyu-Kennett and these occasions are indeed an opportunity to express gratitude and thereby circulate spiritual merit. That's to offer the power of the 'good', that flows from selflessly giving, which liberates beings including oneself.
At the end of the ceremony there is an offertory giving expression to the gratitude we share for our Founders life and work and our collective wish to offer the merit of the gathering to all beings. The offertory opened with: The Dharma Body of the Buddha cannot be seen so long as one is within duality for it is beyond birth and death, filling all things.
The fact that all is of one body, the Dharma Body of the Buddha, has become of special significants recently. There are quite a few people of my acquaintance who are dealing with cancer at the moment. Every situation has its life drama and hard decisions surrounding it. For example I've been talking with a woman whose relatively young daughter is due to have surgery in just over a week’s time. The mother knows it will be a strain on her health to be in the hospital during the surgery. Even so she will more than likely be there close by, sitting still and offering merit.
Although I don't as far as I know have cancer, I'm non the less dealing with it. How could it be otherwise?
