Good evening!
We can sit in peace, harmony, and truth in the autumnal air with cicadas’ singing and the slender moon.
On the east coast about thirty million people are in the path of the hurricane, Irene. The president has warned of a major disaster. Nuclear plants are preparing for blackouts and flooding.
The Japanese people suddenly had an earthquake, tsunami, and nuclear disaster. People believed in the safety of nuclear power and had not dreamed of such a disaster happening to them.
Tens of thousands of people are still evacuated, having lost their homes, lands, jobs, communities, etc. Some of them will never go back to live in their native places.
We don’t know what will happen the next moment in this impermanent world. Birth, sickness, aging, death, loss, parting, etc., are all impermanence, and suffering for us all.
We don’t really know our own inevitable impermanence. We have a lot of natural and human disasters – irradiation by nuke tests, wars, global warming, mass extinction, etc.
All of us are actually responsible for all these individual, social, and global problems by our actions and inactions. People must not be deluded, divided, and ruled by the powers.
We must be awakened from the long night of nescience, as individuals and groups. We must stop our business as usual, and see the impermanence and interconnectedness of all.
Otherwise we may see disasters and catastrophes at any time. This sitting settles us in truth, peace, harmony, and holiness. We must practice this in our own living, with all beings.
8/26/11
