Memorial Day weekend 2015: I keep seeing signs in the community and posts in the social media community thanking those who died in military service to keep us free. And I keep wondering: Which was the last war fought that was actually necessary to preserve American freedom? Not all wars are, clearly. I’m not saying…
In September I drove to Magnolia Grove Monastery in Batesville, Mississippi, to spend a day at a retreat with Thich Nhat Hanh and Zen Buddhist monks and nuns both from this monastery and mindfulness meditation practice center and from Plum Village in France. In many ways this felt long in coming. Years earlier — maybe…
Ray Hemachandra: Marianne, are there times when moral imperatives call for war? Must certain evils — evils that peace may not correct — be confronted militarily? I would not suggest nation-states have shown themselves adept at identifying or acting upon such evils, or that such identifications don’t have a largely subjective component. Obviously they do.…
Ray: Many Native Americans are concerned about the appropriation and exploitation of Indian philosophies by non-natives. Should Indians share native philosophies with non-Indians at all? Jamie: Every Native American person who has the courage to share the beauty and simple goodness of what they have been taught by their elders is creating a bridge between…
