Dear Thay, Dear Brothers and Sisters,
I am a singer, songwriter, and guitar player. I am also a practitioner of the five mindfulness Trainings. I hope that if I were ever confronted with such a difficult situation as the Brothers and Sisters of Bat Nha, that I could respond in the solidly peaceful, compassionate, and upright way that they demonstrated. This is why I practice. It is difficult enough for me to respond with non-violence and love when someone cuts me off on the freeway. How would I respond to direct attacks on my body and on my community? I hope that, like the Brothers and Sisters of Bat Nha, I could choose to respond with fierce and radical compassion and embrace the attackers with love. Wow!
I imagine someone stealing my guitar from my hands and smashing it to pieces in front of my eyes. This would break my heart! I would be very sad to lose the instrument that was given to me by my father, a medium that helps me to sing and write songs.
I would have to look deeply to see that both my father and my mother gave me a gift that reaches beyond that guitar. They gave me the gift of music rooted in love. Their songs are alive in my heart and no-one can take that away from me. I think those songs would grow even stronger if I had no guitar to play, or no hands to strum with, or even no voice to sing. The music would still continue in me.
I think this is what the brothers and sisters of Bat Nha have taught me. Even as their temple was destroyed and their community attacked and scattered, the gift of the practice, of a deep understanding, love and compassion, remained alive in their hearts. This gift continues in them and around them.
Dharma cannot be destroyed. It is ever-changing in form. What the Bat Nha brothers and sisters gave us was a beautiful mirror in which we can see ourselves as bit more clearly and gain greater trust in the practice that is alive in our hearts. This mirror can help us to have a deeper living faith in a way that is unattached to form, alive and always flowing, and that is with us whenever we sit, walk, eat, chant, and sing our songs.
“I burned my guitar
-used it for heat and light-
To bring me through the dark night
Now I have nothing
But these songs to sing.”
Joe Reilly, True Faith of the Heart February 8th, 2010
