The Shamanic Bones of Zen

I often felt my ancestors at ease with my practice of Zen. I felt they had led me through other traditions to this practice of ritual and ceremony. I had participated in rituals and ceremonies of African and Native American traditions but was not trained completely in those traditions. I had not been fused into priesthood with my Orisha (spirit) over my head in the African tradition. While I was a drum and song leader in the Native American Sundance tradition, I had not been a sundancer or pipe carrier. In my long history with the black church, I saw that subtle shades of African culture existed there. Yet my church, black as it was, did not have musical instruments, nor any swaying, clapping, or dancing. The Church of Christ, often mistaken for the Church of God in Christ, grew out the Restoration Movement of the early nineteenth century. Led by Thomas Campbell in Cane Ridge, Kentucky, it had a focus on communion, repentance, baptism, and a cappella singing of hymns-a kind of "Christian primitivism orapostolic," meant to be as close as possible to the word of the Bible in the times it was written. Almost anything with an African flavor was suppressed in such an environment. The influence of this "bare" kind of Christianity was instilled in me at a young age. I am sure it contributed to my ease with Buddhism, in particular Japanese Buddhism, where simplicity is at the heart of the practice. I left the church, my first tribe, for many reasons, including the denial of women to preach. I was clear in my soul that teaching was in my horizon, and I would not be trained to do such at my conservative black church. The place in which my ancestors reached me was in the practice of Nichiren Buddhism and Zen, where I was led to just be. The ancestors needed me to be still and breathe as they approached with what they had to offer my life. It would be these ancestors who guided my Buddhist walk. Buddhism was a path in which I found myself communing with ancestors and being guided by them every day, and not only in occasional ceremony.""--