Infidel Query

[purejuice]

I know many of you out there are theologians/Buddhists much better informed than I.

Let me ask.

Is Pema Chodron really full of the most appalling Suzy Creamcheese/Miss Porter's neuroses/platitudes, and using a very sophisticated system of ethics to -- say, this is the way everyone feels, shazam, this is compassion? Or is it just Oprah brings it out?
http://www.oprah.com/spirit/Oprah-Winfrey-Talks-to-Pema-Chodron

I have been watching episodes of The Life and Times of Vivienne Vyle, which are so scarifying I can neither watch more, nor will I ever be able to walk by Oprah without holding my nose again. Yow.

By the way, what is the difference between pity and compassion?

Comments

[garrity]

As a mother, I find it whoop-out-loud laughable that the woman found in her divorces a reason to go rabbiting off across the globe to study Buddhism and vow herself to helping everyone else's pain while she was also a parent to two young children, and that she now takes others to task for running away from their pain. Hunnybunny, charity does indeed begin at home, and I suspect your kids may have needed your attention more than the dharma did.

[purejuice]

yeah, it does seem hard hearted in a way american buddhists seem to specialize in.

long time no hear, thinking of you and yours, hope all is well with you, and that there was a happy thanksgiving.

[garrity]

Thank you. We are well, although I am in a bit of a self-care cocoon. I keep having the most astonishing and yet totally obvious personal revelations of late. Discussing them feels too noisy of me, like I'll scare away the flock of birds that keep landing here and there on my mental roof.

I expect it will all settle in a while.

[purejuice]

i'm glad.
waverly fitzgerald is just about the only pagan i can stand. though i am pretty much a believer. she has a wonderful "harvest packet" talking about this time of year, and the eleusinian and other mysteries of going into the dark which are commemorated at this time. it is the time for doing what you're doing, it seems. be sure to bury a loaf of bread in your garden.