Honey Locust Sangha
Omaha Community of Mindful Living
  • Home
  • Our Practice
    • Weekly Meditation
    • Monthly Half Day of Mindfulness
    • Days of Mindfulness
    • Annual Retreat >
      • Retreat Sign Up
    • TNH Quarterly Video Series
    • Monthly Calendar
  • Practice Resources
    • Gathas (Mindfulness Verses)
    • Beginning Anew
    • The Five Remembrances >
      • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • Mindful Breathing (Meditation 101)
    • Touching the Earth
    • 5 Contemplations (Eating Meditation) >
      • August 2022 CTC Minutes
      • CTC Minutes April 24 2022
    • 5 Mindfulness Trainings (Guidance for Mindful Living)
    • Deep Relaxation
    • Meditating with Difficult Feelings
    • Peace Treaty (A Practice for Dealing with Anger)
    • Outdoor Walking Meditation
    • Indoor Walking Meditation
    • Meditation on No Birth, No Death
  • Articles by Thich Nhat Hanh
    • The Heart Sutra
    • Flames of Prayer
    • March 2021 CTC minutes
    • On Reincarnation
    • Mother Earth Is Inside Of Us
    • Walking Meditation
    • The Story of a River
    • Why Do We Have to Die One Day?
    • Impermanence
    • Poem: In Praise of Mother Earth
  • Dharma Talks by Some of Our Teachers
  • Sangha Musings - Poems, Prayers, Reflections
  • Videos
  • Christian/Buddhist Dialogue Articles
    • Richard Rohr- Unitive Consciousness
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- Home is the Way: A Christmas Message
    • Paul Knitter- God/Love: the compassionate energy of the interconnecting spirit.
    • Katherine Fransson- Eyes of Thich Nhat Hanh
    • Mike McMahon- An Introduction to Christian/Buddhist dialogue
    • David Stendl-Rast- A Catholic Monk Practicing Buddhism
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- The Holy Spirit and Mindfulness
    • Thich Nhat Hanh- Going Back to Our Religious Roots
    • Anthony de Mello, SJ.- Conversations with the Master
    • Mike McMahon-A Lotus Blooming in the Catholic Church
    • Mike McMahon- Buddhist Approach to Doctrine (Teachings are relative truth)
    • Joan Chittister- Practice Compassion and You Will Become It
    • August 2022 CTC Minutes
    • Notes from Thomas Merton's Asian Journal
    • Paul Knitter
  • Caretaking Council
    • February 2023 CTC Minutes
    • January 2023 CTC
    • December 2022 minutes
    • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • October 2022 CTC Minutes
    • August 2022 CTC Minutes
    • July 2022 CTC Miinutes
    • June 2022 CTC minutes
    • April 24 2022 CTC Minutes
    • April 10 2022 CTC Minutes
    • March 2022 CTC minutes
    • February 2022 CTC Minutes
    • January 2022 CTC Minutes
    • December 2021 CTC Minutes
    • November 2021 CTC minutes
    • October 2021 CTC Minutes
    • September 2021 Minutes
    • August 2021 CTC Minutes
    • July 2021 CTC Minutes
    • June 2021 CTC Minutes
    • April 2021 CTC Minutes
    • February 202CTC Minutes
    • January 2021 CTC Minutes
    • November 2020 CTC Minutes
    • October 2020 CTC minutes
    • Sept 2020 CTC minutes
    • January 19, 2020 CTC Minutes >
      • November 2022 CTC Minutes
    • October 2019 CTC minutes
    • September 2019 CTC Minutes
    • August 2019 Caretaking Coucil
    • March 2019 Caretaking Council Minutes
    • October 2018 CTC minutes
    • September 2018 CTC minutes
    • August 2018 CTC Minutes
    • July 2018 CTC minutes
    • April 2018 CTC Minutes
    • January 2018 CTC Minutes
    • November 2017 CTC minutes
    • August 2017 CTC Minutes
    • July 2017 CTC Minutes
    • May 2017 CTC Minutes
    • April 2017 CTC Minutes
    • March 2017 CTC Minutes
    • September 2016 Minutes
  • Adventures in Buddhist/Christian Spirituality
  • Sangha Directory
  • March 2023 CTC Minutes



Eyes of Our Maker


Each day my Lord,
Let me stop 100 times
and breathe deep, the Holy Spirit.
100 times
let me step out of the market place
where I have built my life.
Let me stop and breathe,
in order to arrive in your kingdom.

100 times to breathe your air,
to feel your sun warming me,
and with each breath,
let this truth,
penetrate my flesh and blood and bones:

That my life is full
of the beauty and goodness
of your universe.
My life itself is the majestic dance
of sunlight and wind
of earth and ocean.

Upon my return to the marketplace
let me walk nobly, head high,
a sovereign member of your kingdom.
And in the midst of those voices.
the buyers and the sellers,
100 times, Lord,
let me hear you whisper:

 “My child, you are good,
beyond beauty and plainness,
beyond wisdom and ignorance,
beyond wealth and poverty.
You are good
beyond success and failure,
beyond power and helplessness.
For in my kingdom,
these are small.
In my kingdom,
beloved child,
you are radiant as the sun.”
                                  Mike McMahon


The Eyes of Our Maker (Video)

A Brief Introduction to Christian/Buddhist Dialogue
By Mike McMahon

Picture


Mike McMahon is a long-time practitioner in both the Christian (Catholic) and Buddhist Traditions.  He has been ordained as a lay member of Thich Nhat Hanh's Order of Interbeing, and has been certified as a spiritual director through Creighton University. He is a founding member of the Honey Locust Sangha- a group in Omaha, NE which practices mindful living in the tradition of Thich Nhat Hanh.





If you are a Christian encountering Buddhist teachings for the first time, I offer you this reflection to help:
The Buddhist experience, born not of concepts and thoughts, but of the experience of meditation (letting go thoughts), is that teachings, concepts, theology, do a very poor job of conveying the deep nature of life, of reality. Buddhism asks you not to be attached to it's teachings (or any teachings or concepts), or they will not be helpful to you. From the Buddhist point of view, in all the cosmos, the only thing that is real is this present moment of life that we are living.  Everything else is just a thought.

All spiritual teachings are tools which we can use to help open ourselves to a deep, open, loving experience of life in this moment. If you are not able to open to and explore the idea that the teachings, the theology, are only relative truth (an idea, that you will find among Christian Theologians, including those represented in articles on this website) then you will have nothing but frustration in this dialogue.

If you are a Buddhist desiring to be nourished by  Christian thought and practice,  I offer you this small reflection to help (note: this is, according to my life experience, my own poetic description of  how Christianity is in the world. I make no claim to define or describe Christianity for anyone else, or in any kind of absolute way):
At its most beautiful and eloquent depths, Christian theology is a poetic attempt to convey deep and profound encounters with life and reality. Christian practice is the ongoing process of opening heart and mind to unconditional love of all people, places and things.  St Thomas Aquinas, who spent a lifetime composing the most elegant, intricate, detailed theology of life and Christ and God, said towards the end of his life, that his writings were "so much straw".  If you approach the teachings as poetry (some Christian theologians will object to this, some will not) pointing to the deep and profound mystery of life, you will be able to be nourished by the beautiful heart of Christianity.


The Honey Locust Sangha / Omaha Community of Mindful Living is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization. All funds donated help to fulfill the mission of practicing and raising awareness of the mindfulness practice in the Thich Nhat Hanh / Plum Village tradition.

​You can donate (provide Dana) using the PayPal link at the left (you do not need a PayPal account) or send via Venmo to @HoneyLocust. Please indicate General Dana or specific event (December DoM, for example) in the text via Venmo.