Word: buddhism
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Chinese have fallen for Tibet. Growing numbers of Chinese now practice Tibet's form of Buddhism, fill their glasses with Tibetan booze and consider a jaunt on the high plateau a badge of cool. Many of the Tibetan practices they ape can be as tacky as white men in redface doing a rain dance. Yet given that official propaganda has for decades blamed Tibetan culture itself for keeping Tibetans poor, ignorant and not above suspicion of cannibalism, this sudden interest shows the government's decreasing ability to mold public opinion, and the growing independence of Chinese trendmakers. "More information about...
...prophet Joel certainly didn't have Tibetan Buddhism in mind when he addressed his Jewish audience in the 5th century B.C. But that's the beauty of the dreams and visions of religion: you never know who may have them next...
Willis, 52, is an African-American professor of Buddhism at Wesleyan University. At her home in Middletown, Conn., she points to a snapshot of the 1981 encounter, noting that only after a decade of meditation was she able to examine her blackness. She adds, "I became able to deal with the deep wounds of race because of Buddhist practice...
...fled the turbulence of the late '60s in search of inner and outer peace. The only woman among 60 monks, she learned the chants, devotional rituals and what she considers to be the essence of Tibetan Buddhism: the practice of visualization, or imagining yourself a Buddha to become one. "Buddhism is a come-and-see model," she says. "Meditation is the path. You don't have to accept dogma. You have to spend time on the cushion." Her time on the cushion has yielded the upcoming memoir Dreaming Me: An African American Woman's Spiritual Journey...
Willis hopes to popularize the personal. In the U.S., she contends, Buddhism remains a religion of white elites. The few practicing African Americans tend to belong to Soka Gakkai International, a school of the religion that emphasizes simple chanting, usually for prosperity. Willis prefers a more rigorous dharma and is developing meditations for Buddhist centers that focus on race. Her teachings have not yet reached the masses, but, as she is quick to point out, "I'm not a proselytizer." She is, however, a philosopher with a bold agenda. "People tell you for centuries that you're just a cattle...