Open Gate Equinox News 2026
Our precious ship spins and circles the same path for something like an eon. We humans, but a blink in time, feel and note this tipping moment when light and dark were equal. Record world heat of summer of 2026 lingers.
A world outside surrounds us in more heat, a cauldron of fear, cruelty, warfare, hunger. Discord shakes our gentle nest. Yet here we do find shelter, refuge in the Jewels, comfort in fellowship, a harbor amid the threatening weather of a troubled sea
We spy ahead the cold dark season of varied celebrations replete with lights and candles. Ancients from all tribes lit gatherings to urge Ol Sol’s return.
But we get ahead of ourselves. Now is our time to look back over our shoulders: Our meditation nourished as well as it challenged. We’ve achievements, aspirations and colloquy in our sangha. We joyed in ordinary, easy exchanges among new and old trusted dharma friends.
IN THIS QUATER TURN::
Our Six-week Practice period drew to closure. Practice was enhanced by more sitting time, mornings and evenings. Book study enrichment met on a weekly basis rather than the usual once a month.
June 26 – 28 Amid our Practice enhancement we dove into a Weekend Retreat. Building a cocoon of noble silent meditation, we share our energy. All sit, move as one, eat in formal rituals, where our true self may reveal.
July 11 Practice Period Council. Primarily a Native American tradition, discovered by Roshi Joan Halifax. Tribal elders urged her to keep this alive. A talking piece is passed. Speaking from, and listening fully, with heart is cultivated. Zen is overwhelmingly silence. In council we get to speak. We circled in unique embracive trust. An array of issues emerged: a simple check-in, what is going on in my Zen practice, some deeply personal. Relational issues cheek by jowl with another, how they’re dealing with our tumultuous world outside. We learned more about listening, and nurtured silently.
July 18 marked our Jukai Ceremony. We saw four ordained this year. Chris Ariante, Jeremy Schmall, Jennifer Stiff, and Erica Echavarria “took the Precepts,” declaring they are Buddhists. Shoryu returned here from Santa Fe, New Mexico to assist Sensei Shinzan in facilitating. More on this will follow.
July 21 – 26th Our Practice Period culminated in a full sesshin, a weeklong Zen Retreat. As in the weekend one above, this takes us further. In Zen we sit not to get something, but to be here and now. We might open our gate, realize our true, original self, non-self: I am all, all is me.
We put an end on the retreat and entire Practice Period in a closing council July 26. In recalling the activities, and learnings, a few remarked on feeing a relative ease participating in the early mornings, and other enhancements in this year’s Practice Period. Again, we commented, reflected on the rewards, the resistances we experienced, and processed. All voiced their deep gratitude for all the support in this, progressing together as one body.
NEW GATE RETREAT
Sept 13 Bodhidharma Day: Shinzan introduced us to a unique no bells, no schedule, other than enter one of 3 moments in the day: 9:00 am, noon or 3:00. One could stay any 3 hours to all day. Face the wall, take slow kinhin, walking meditation at our own timing. Stop to take our bagged lunch on our own, and sit again, and again, for an hour this time, any segment maybe 10 minutes, following our own rhythms. In mindful silence, eat, drink, pause outside in back garden when our own rhythm demanded. It gave an experience both powerful and ordinary, familiar and unique in one.
Then at culmination of the full day, a few minutes to stretch, shift prepare for:
Ceremony for our new priest candidates. Seido, Jisen & Anzan have volunteered; now they’ve begun sewing their own robes. Some of us donated material. Reading, trainings, activities will culminate a distance down a shared road. This night we gathered to celebrate and encourage as we witness their bowing, chanting, call and responses with Sensei Shinzan as he leads them in their aspiration and dedication. Bowing, they express willingness, their healthy desire to volunteer for the rigor of deep service to all, total availability that Zen priesthood demands. We all joined in voluminous sharing, some tearful love. A surprisingly fathomless depth of respectful welling of pure joy.
All three are perfect for this. Paramount is their genuine humility, amid manifold talents and skills, depth of intelligence. Never lording over, they sit alongside us with a genuine curiosity. Each has a depth of service deeply engrained, ubiquitously expressed. In the least: Anzan’s practice as a teacher, where his Buddhism enhances the learning of a thousand plus young minds, their humanity. Seido is a retired Nurse for whom it is a calling, that continues through her Reiki healing. Soon she will travel to Japan to pursue a challenging growth period, resulting in a qualification from the source. Jisen continues her years, decades now, of services, many with the elderly. She celebrates their accomplishments, talents, abilities, she recounts all she learns from them. She remarked a couple years ago how Buddhist practice opened the door to just listening, she performs in her volunteering in Hospice. These are just single snapshots of their many services. Each embodies their own distinct, what is it? an inborn talent, an ability, a skill one develops? They Listen. One has that feeling of really being “heard.” Priceless.
