Buddhist Life, Spirituality, Spiritual Life - Christian Life, Spirituality - Roman Catholic, Zen Buddhism
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Overview
In August 1974, following conversion to the Catholic faith while living in a Trappist monastery, David Hackett set out on a two-year journey to Japan and Southeast Asia. His journey led to meetings and meditations with Catholic priests and Zen masters sympathetic to Catholicism. The letters he sent to Father Thomas Keating chronicle Hackett's changing experience with Zen meditation and Christianity. Glittering with insight, this book explores the value and pitfalls of borrowing from different religions in the practice of contemplation.Editorials
Library Journal
At the time Hackett (religion, Univ. of Florida, Gainsville) wrote the letters that this book comprises, he was a young man, recently converted to Roman Catholicism. He was struggling to reconcile his grounding in Zen practice with his newfound Christian faith and the possibility of a calling to the contemplative life of the Trappist. His correspondence, the bulk of which is from Japan, is with Father Thomas Keating, the abbot of a Trappist monastery in upstate New York. Throughout his letters, Hackett's spiritual trials are expressed in clear and insightful language that brings alive the core issues surrounding the mysterious intersection that occurs between Zen and Catholicism, as well as the areas where the two seem to be irreconcilable. In the few letters of reply from Father Thomas offered here, we see the gentle working of a spiritually experienced guide. A clearly written and important book for anyone interested in Zen and Catholicism and, to a lesser extent, in comparative religion in general.-Mark Woodhouse, Elmira Coll. Lib., N.Y.Book Details
Published
December 31, 1997
Publisher
New York : Continuum, 1996.
Pages
176
Format
Hardcover
ISBN
9780826407801