Reflections on being a Buddhist Christian

I began reading When Things Fall Apart by Pema Chodron. Publishers weekly calls it the "Tibetan Buddhist equivalent to Harold Kushner's When Bad Things Happen to Good People."

I began reading it to expand my thinking on suffering. As a Christian theologican, I have lots of Christian doctrine and biblical understanding to offer suffering. But in my own life, I'm finding the need for different words to understand the concept of "dying to self." For the next month, I'll offer quotes and thoughts that stick out from this book.

To begin, I was struck, stopped in my tracks when we used the phrase "nailed to the present moment." My favorite theology of the cross (and there are many, although most Christians only learn one called "substitutionary atonement") is "kenosis," or the act of emptying oneself in death. This doctrine comes from Philippians 2 in the Christian scriptures. "Jesus did not grasp equality with God but instead submitted himself to death."

On page 12-13 she says, "Each day, we're given many opportunities to poen up or shut down. The most precious opportunities presents itself when we come to the place where we think we can't handle whatever is happening. It's too much. It's gone too far. We feel bad about ourselves. There's no way we can manipulate the situation to make ourselves come out looking good. No matter how hard we try, it just won't work. Basically, life has just nailed us."

Buddhism teaches us that each moment holds for us an invitation to let go of self, ego, expectations, desire, even hope. Christianity teaches us that Jesus accepted this invitation on the cross and we are told to live as Jesus did.