Story highlights The Dalai Lama will attend the National Prayer Breakfast on Thursday with President Obama Buddhists were viewed with suspicious by the U.S. government during World War II

Yet it might also serve as a reminder that a religion now considered universally benign once endured suspicion, vocal protest and even government surveillance -- much as Islam has in recent years.

Already, 2015 has seen threats of violence canceling a call to prayer in North Carolina, anti-Muslim demonstrations in Texas and Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal comparing non-assimilating Muslims to an "invasion."

All of this would have been familiar to some Buddhists not so long ago.

Today, Buddhism is the model of a minority religious tradition that exerts an influence far beyond what its numbers would suggest. While the Buddhist population of the United States is not much larger than a million -- less than 1% of the population -- the number of Americans inspired by the Buddha is estimated to be more than 10 times that size.

The cultural position of Buddhism 73 years ago could not have been more different.

When Franklin D. Roosevelt signed Executive Order 9066 in February 1942, authorizing the evacuation of all those of Japanese descent from the West Coast to war relocation centers, the Buddhist faith practiced by many Japanese Americans was itself regarded as a potential threat.

After the attack on Pearl Harbor and the formal entry of the United States into World War II, the FBI compiled a list of suspected collaborators that included not only members of groups with political ties to Japan, but the leaders of Buddhist temples.

FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover's Custodial Detention List used a classification system designating the supposed risk of individuals on an A-B-C scale, with an "A" assigned to those deserving greatest suspicion. In Hoover's system, Buddhist priests were designated "A-1": "dangerous enemy aliens" whose arrest was considered a matter of urgent concern.

Even before the war, Japanese Buddhists were thought to be less "Americanized" than their countrymen who had converted to Christianity, and in some ways this was true.

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When Buddhists were Public Enemy No. 1

Buddhism originated in India in the 6th century BC. It consists of the teachings of the Buddha, Gautama Siddhartha. Of the main branches of Buddhism, it is the Mahayana or "Greater Vehicle" Buddhism which found its way to Japan.

Buddhism was imported to Japan via China and Korea in the form of a present from the friendly Korean kingdom of Kudara (Paikche) in the 6th century. While Buddhism was welcomed by the ruling nobles as Japan's new state religion, it did not initially spread among the common people due to its complex theories.

There were also a few initial conflicts with Shinto, Japan's native religion. The two religions were soon able to co-exist and even complement each other.

During the Nara Period, the great Buddhist monasteries in the capital Nara, such as Todaiji, gained strong political influence and were one of the reasons for the government to move the capital to Nagaoka in 784 and then to Kyoto in 794. Nevertheless, the problem of politically ambitious and militant monasteries remained a main issue for the governments over many centuries of Japanese history.

During the early Heian Period, two new Buddhist sects were introduced from China: the Tendai sect in 805 by Saicho and the Shingon sect in 806 by Kukai. More sects later branched off the Tendai sect. Among these, the most important ones are mentioned below:

In 1175, the Jodo sect (Pure Land sect) was founded by Honen. It found followers among all different social classes since its theories were simple and based on the principle that everybody can achieve salvation by strongly believing in the Buddha Amida. In 1224, the Jodo-Shinshu (True Pure Land sect) was founded by Honen's successor Shinran. The Jodo sects continue to have millions of followers today.

In 1191, the Zen sect was introduced from China. Its complicated theories were popular particularly among the members of the military class. According to Zen teachings, one can achieve self enlightenment through meditation and discipline. At present, Zen seems to enjoy a greater popularity overseas than within Japan.

The Lotus Hokke or Nichiren sect, was founded by Nichiren in 1253. The sect was exceptional due to its intolerant stance towards other Buddhist sects. Nichiren Buddhism still has many millions of followers today, and several "new religions" are based on Nichiren's teachings.

Oda Nobunaga and Toyotomi Hideyoshi fought the militant Buddhist monasteries (especially the Jodo sects) at the end of the 16th century and practically extinguished Buddhist influence on the political sector.

Buddhist institutions were attacked again in the early years of the Meiji Period, when the new Meiji government favored Shinto as the state religion and tried to separate and emancipate it from Buddhism.

Link:
Japanese Buddhism - japan-guide.com - Japan Travel and ...

A Birthday Tribute as a Token of Gratitude Chicago, February 03, 2015 (Zenit.org) Fr. Robert Barron | 569 hits

Here is a reflection byFather Robert Barron, founder of the global ministryWord on Fire, and the Rector/President ofMundeleinSeminary. He is the creator of the award winning documentary series, "Catholicism"and"Catholicism:The New Evangelization."

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I write these words on the 100th anniversary of the birth of Thomas Merton, one of the greatest spiritual writers of the20th century and a man who had a decisive influence on me and my vocation to the priesthood.I first encountered Mertons writing in a peculiar way.My brother and I were both working at a bookstore in the Chicago suburbs.One afternoon, he tossed to me a tattered paperback with a torn cover that the manager had decided to discard.My brother said, You might like this; its written by a Trappist monk.I replied, with the blithe confidence of a sixteen year old, I dont want to read a book by some Buddhist. With exquisite sensitivity, he responded, Trappists are Catholics, you idiot.

The book in question wasThe Seven Storey Mountain, Thomas Mertons passionate, articulate, smart, and deeply moving account of his journey from worldling to Trappist monk.Though much of the philosophy and theology was, at that time, over my head, I became completely caught up in the drama and romance of Mertons story, which is essentially the tale of how a man fell in love with God. The book is extraordinarily well written, funny, adventurous, and spiritually wise.In one of the blurbs written for the first edition, Fulton Sheen referred to it as a contemporary version of St. AugustinesConfessions, and it was fulsomely praised by both Evelyn Waugh and Graham Greene.Moreover, it contributed massively to the startling influx of young men into monasteries and religious communities across the United States in the postwar era.

I was so thrilled by my first encounter with Merton that I dove headlong into his body of writing.The Sign of Jonas, a journal that Merton kept in the years leading up to his priestly ordination, became a particular favorite.That work concludes with an essay called Firewatch:July 4, 1952, which Jacques Maritain referred to as the greatest piece of spiritual writing in the twentieth century.In this powerful meditation, Merton uses the mundane monastic task of walking through the monastery checking for fires as a metaphor for a Dantesque examination of the soul.The Sign of Jonasis marked by Mertons playful and ironic sense of humor, but it also gives evidence of the enormous range of his reading and intellectual interests.To devour that book as a nineteen year old, as I did, was to receive an unparalleled cultural education.For many people of my generation, Merton opened the door to the wealth of the Catholic spiritual tradition: I first learned about John of the Cross, Meister Eckhart, Teresa of Avila, Bernard of Clairvaux, Odo of Cluny, the Victorines, Origen, Thrse of Lisieux, and Hans Urs von Balthasar from him.

Perhaps the central theme of all of Mertons writings is contemplation.What he stressed over and again in regard to this crucial practice is that it is not the exclusive preserve of spiritual athletes, but rather something that belongs to all the baptized and that stands at the heart of Christian life.For contemplation is, in his language, to find the place in you where you are here and now being created by God.It is consciously to discover a new center in God and hence at the same time to discover the point of connection to everyone and everything else in the cosmos.Following the French spiritual masters, Merton called thisle point vierge, the virginal point, or to put it in the language of the fourth Gospel, water bubbling up in you to eternal life.In his famous epiphanic experience at the corner of 4thand Walnut in downtown Louisville, Merton felt, throughle point vierge, a connection to the ordinary passersby so powerful it compelled him to exclaim, There is no way of telling people that they are all walking around shining like the sun.

Sadly, for many younger Catholics today, Merton, if he is known at all, is viewed with a certain suspicion, and this for two reasons.First, when he was a man of fifty-one, he fell in love with a young nurse who cared for him after back surgery.Though it is almost certain that this was exclusively an affair of the heart, it was certainly, to say the very least, unseemly for a middle-aged monk and priest to have been so infatuated with a much younger woman.At the same time, Merton worked through this confusing period and returned to his vowed monastic life.And the journal that he kept during that year is so spiritually alert and illuminating that I often recommend it to brother priests who are wrestling with the promise of celibacy.To dismiss Merton out of hand because of this admittedly inappropriate relationship strikes me as disproportionate.

The second reason that some younger Catholics are wary of Merton is his interest, in the last roughly ten years of his life, in Eastern religions, especially Buddhism.They see this as an indication of a religious relativism or a vague syncretism.Nothing could be further from the truth.Merton was indeed fascinated by the Eastern religions and felt that Christians could benefit from a greater understanding of their theory and practice, but he never for a moment felt that all the religions were the same or that Christians should move to some space beyond Christianity.In order to verify this, all one has to do is read the prefaces to his major books on Zen and Buddhism.About ten years ago, I had the privilege of giving a retreat to the monks at Mertons monastery of Gethsemani in Kentucky.Just after the retreat ended, Mertons secretary, Br. Patrick Hart, took me in a jeep out to see the hermitage that Merton occupied the last few years of his life.While we were sitting on the front porch of the small house, he looked at me intently and said, Could you tell anyone thats interested that Thomas Merton died a monk of Gethsemani Abbey and a priest of the Catholic Church?He was as bothered as I am by the silly suggestion that Merton, at the end of his life, was on the verge of leaving the priesthood or abandoning the Catholic faith.

Thomas Merton was not perfect, and he might not have been a saint.But he was indeed a master of the spiritual life, and his life and work had a profound effect on me and an army of others around the world.I offer this birthday tribute as a small token of gratitude.

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The 100th Anniversary of Thomas Merton's Birth

In the final chapter of the Explore Lifelong Learning groups spirituality section, Dave Weider shared what Buddhism is all about.

Herald photo by Jodi Schellenberg

Dave Weider spoke at the Explore Lifelong Learning group on Tuesday about Buddhism.

I became interested in spirituality probably 20 years ago when I was in university, Weider said. I had a few of my own personal life struggles but at that point in my life I felt as though I had everything materially that I needed that I should have been happy.

I was in school, I had a roof over my head, I had a good family, everything that I had I felt that through all that there was something missing for me, there was a bit of a lacking or a void in my life.

Weider started to search for his meaning of life, where he said many people start when heading down the spiritual path.

This journey begins with many of us as this longing or feeling that there is some dissatisfaction, some unsatisfactory aspect of our lives that we cant put our fingers on, he said. At that time, I became a seeker. I started to look for answers in different traditions.

Since he was raised in the Roman Catholic Church, he was exposed to those traditions but was open to exploring other avenues.

Those questions I was asking myself were exactly the same questions that the Buddha asked himself at an early age, he said. Those same questions have existed for millennia and the Buddha has claimed and taught that he found some answers to some of those questions over 2,600 years ago.

Buddha was born Siddhrtha Gautama in in Lumbini, India in the sixth century BCE.

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Lifelong Learning group explores Buddhism