Monthly Archives: July 2023

Appamada Zen Center, Austin, TX Peg Syverson and Flint Sparks are the Senior Teachers at the Appamada Zen Center in Austin, Texas, although Peg lives in a suburb outside Chicago and Flint lives in Hawaii. The nature of Zen Centers has changed since the COVID-19 outbreak, and now many centers do much of their workContinue reading “Peg Syverson”

Dharma Rain, Portland, Oregon Kakumyo Lowe-Charde is the Dharma heir of Gyokuko Carlson. After serving as co-abbot of the Dharma Rain Zen Center in Portland, Oregon, with her in 2017 and ’18, he became primary Abbot when she retired in 2019. Dharma Rain itself, he informs me, is currently on a fourteen-acre site which hadContinue reading “Kakumyo Lowe-Charde”

Joyful Mind Zendo, Rockville, Maryland For Martine Palmiter there is a natural connection between the contemporary concept of being “woke” to racial or gender injustices inherent in societal structures and the concept of awakening found in Buddhism.  “I was raised American Baptist, and I loved going to church with my mother. And it was oneContinue reading “Martine Taikai Palmiter”

[This is an abridgement of my chapter on Taizan Maezumi in The Third Step East.] Hakuyu Taizan Maezumi was in the unique position of having teaching authority in three lineages, Soto, Rinzai, and Sanbo Kyodan (later called Sanbo Zen). No one was more qualified to promote Zen in the West. Born in 1931, he wasContinue reading “Taizan Maezumi”