Secularizing Buddhism: New Perspectives on a Dynamic Tradition by Richard Payne

Author:Richard Payne [Payne, Richard]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Religion, buddhism, General
ISBN: 9781611808896
Google: ZOs2EAAAQBAJ
Publisher: Shambhala Publications, Incorporated
Published: 2021-11-15T23:40:45.763520+00:00

A Wider Sense of Responsibility

I have sketched three broad orientations among contemporary Western Buddhists: the Traditional, the Secular, and the Immanent. While I distinguish Immanent Buddhism as a distinct modality, I also noted that Buddhists who fall into each of these three modalities can entertain immanent aims and may even give them precedence in their practice. Thus Buddhists following all three modes may give primacy to the “immanent” task of navigating their way through today’s chaotic and perplexing world. In the West, however, those who adopt Buddhism as a spiritual path have tended to focus mainly on the enrichment and deepening of their personal life rather than on applying Buddhist values to the task of transforming the larger structures under which we live—the political, social, and economic structures responsible for the suffering of war, hunger and poverty, racism and ethnic hostility, ecological devastation, and sexual and gender-based violence.

This trend poses a risk that contemporary approaches to the dharma may foster a purely private type of spirituality pursued mainly by educated, upper-middle-class people in the tranquility of their meditation halls and dharma centers. While Socially Engaged Buddhism has served as an antidote to this tendency, coordinated projects of social engagement have won relatively limited support among Buddhists, whether in the East or the West. Though Buddhism elevates loving-kindness and compassion to the highest ranks in the moral life, we seldom see Buddhists undertaking the truly self-sacrificial risks on behalf of vulnerable populations that we see among conscientious Christians, Jews, and even nonreligious people.

It is here perhaps that Buddhists have much to learn from Christianity and Judaism. Christianity has enunciated a social gospel that calls on the faithful to serve the poor, the sick, the homeless, and the hungry—the wretched of the earth—to undertake not only deeds of charity but daring acts of political and social resistance on behalf of justice and human dignity. As manifestations of their faith, Christians have created impressive humanitarian organizations that save the lives of millions. Yet Buddhists have lagged behind in such undertakings. We do make our contributions, to be sure—for instance, through the Buddhist Peace Fellowship (based in the United States), the Tzuchi Foundation (based in Taiwan, with US branches), Sarvodaya (based in Sri Lanka), and Buddhist Global Relief (based in the United States), as well as an umbrella organization, the International Network of Engaged Buddhists, that brings together disparate Buddhists to share insights and engage in common projects. But these have been minority efforts, far outweighed by the offering of courses in mindfulness meditation as the cure for all the ills the world is facing.

The reason for this feeble responsiveness to collective suffering may be partly rooted in Buddhist doctrine. The Buddhist scriptures are filled with praise of kindness and compassion and exhortations to act for the good of all sentient beings, yet seldom do they advise Buddhists to actively strive for social justice, to resist tyranny, or to stand up against the degrading material and social conditions that afflict disadvantaged and marginalized communities.

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