Good evening. So this week is the 4th of July. So tonight, I'm going to give my annual talk on Independence Day, or Interdependence Day, or Interconnectedness Day, or actually, the integration of independence and interdependence. I think of this as an American Buddhist holiday. So some of you have heard previous versions of this talk. The American ideal of freedom, which is celebrated this week, is related to the Buddhist ideal of liberation and the Bodhisattva principles of liberating all beings, wishing may all beings be happy. And in some ways, we're acknowledging interconnection and interdependence when we celebrate Independence Day.

[01:12]

tradition of Buddhist liberation mostly has to do with realizing interdependence, but realizing some kind of personal liberation, a psychological liberation. The American ideal of freedom, liberty, and justice for all is about realizing this communally, together in our society. But really, they come together, I would say, in our zazen. This zazen we've just been doing has many different names, the Jumara Samadhi and many other ways of talking about it. Samadhi of self-fulfillment, self-realization. But it's also the Samadhi of all beings. When we sit together like this in the meditation hall, we're sitting together, we're supporting each other to be upright, to be present, to settle into our most fundamental awareness.

[02:31]

Not that that's always what's happening on our cushion, but we have the possibility of communing with all beings. realizing our communion with all beings in space and time. Our samadhi supports all beings. Everybody you've ever known and everybody you have never known is part of what's happening on your seat as we sit. Of course, through the particular lens of the particular body-mind on our seat here tonight, And so this also has to do with, again, this wish to may all beings be happy, our bodhisattva precepts, and the precept of benefiting all beings. So we have 16 bodhisattva precepts in our tradition, but they come down to benefiting all beings, to being helpful rather than harmful, to support helpfulness rather than harm.

[03:38]

And a radical respect for all beings. That's actually a complicated or sometimes challenging idea. But to radically respect all beings means to respect each person, each being's quality of expressing everything. But Buddhism does not mean being nice. So as part of our precepts, we also can speak truth to power. We can name harm that's being done. And actually, it's part of our precepts to do that, to not pretend that everything is nice and beautiful and wonderful and smiley face. Now, to name harm that's being done does not mean to indulge in hate speech or to be hateful towards anyone.

[04:48]

We can listen to the concerns and fears of those with whom we disagree. In fact, it's important to do that. But how do we respond to harm? How do we be helpful in the face of harm being done? strongly, non-violently, but strongly. And there are lots of examples of this, Dr. King, for one, but many in our society and in Buddhist tradition. So this idea of freedom, liberty, and justice for all in our society is really an interesting support for bodhisattva ideas, and an ideal that wasn't necessarily part of Asian Buddhism, or a lot of Asian Buddhism, which happened in feudal societies, where there was not even the idea of that kind of freedom

[06:05]

So just to invoke Thomas Jefferson, who embodies the total koan of America as a slaveholder and a contributor to the theft of Native American land, at least some of his writings I mean, he was a brilliant man, but also he was of his time, including being a Southern slaveholder. But some of his writings are brilliant advocacies for democracy and liberty and have continued as inspirations for many. So the possibility that the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution established that we celebrate this week, 4th of July, the day after tomorrow. Presented possibilities, so we hold these truths to be self-evident that all men, and at that point it was only men, are created equal, endowed, and they said by the declaration says, by the creator, with certain inalienable rights, among those are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.

[07:14]

But Jefferson had the idea, if not the actualization, of a really radical sense of liberation. He vowed eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the human mind. So as we do zazen, the samadhi of all beings, we see the various forms of tyranny so often self-imposed, sometimes culturally imposed, imposed by our society, but that the forms of tyranny that hold on to us, the forms of greed, hate, and delusion. So Jefferson also said the price of liberation is eternal, is ongoing vigilance, a good motto for Zazen. So this, liberation, whether Buddhist liberation or the freedom of democracy, requires ongoing vigilance. Jefferson also said, I hope we can crush in its birth the aristocracy of our money corporations, which dare already to challenge our government to a trial by strength and bid defiance to the laws of our country.

[08:28]

Well, at this point, we know who's who's won that challenge. But again, we still have these ideals. And these ideals have been expanded. So of course, in the Constitution and Declaration, only men and only property men were given equal rights. Now, 100 years ago, women are allowed to vote after the Civil War. African-American people who are considered property in the Constitution and the Declaration are now theoretically allowed to vote and have rights. These ideals We still celebrate. We celebrate them this week. And it's important that we still have these ideals. And they show the possibility for change and a realistic hopefulness or possibility of expanding ideals. And people, even with the corruption of voting rights and so forth, people still have the possibility to produce change and support well-being.

[09:38]

And that happens. Lincoln said, government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth. Now we seem to have government of the billionaires, by the billionaires, and for the billionaires. This, what I've just said, is part of what some of you have heard me say in previous Interdependence Day talks. On the 4th of July, I feel a responsibility as a clergy person, to put it that way, a responsibility to the precepts of liberation, to speak about how our country's doing, hopefully from the perspective of bodhisattva values, from moral values, And to speak difficult truths as I see them, and I hope there'll be some time for discussion. So there are a number of situations that I just want to mention. The first, which I'll say more about, is this situation now of children being separated from their parents at the border, our immigration crisis.

[10:46]

And children being literally kept in cages, Some of them reportedly injected with possibly dangerous drugs. Now, toddlers have been, literally three-year-olds, have been forced to go to hearings, immigration hearings, on their own, separated from their parents, in shackles, children in shackles, with no attorney or representative. It was a three-year-old who stood up on a table, and they don't even speak, in some cases, English, or can't respond to what's being said about them. This is what's happening now in this country. Some of those children who are separated from their parents apparently are in Chicago, and I don't know exactly where. This is still going on, even though the president said that they wouldn't be separated anymore. There are at least 2,000, or more than 2,000, who remain separated. No clear records were kept to connect the parents and children when this happened.

[11:52]

In many cases, there's no way to find these children for the parents or for the children to find their parents. This is barbarous. that this is happening in our country. This is children being tortured. Now the Trump administration says it has the right to detain immigrant families and their children indefinitely. Without having, only for being charged with the misdemeanor of illegally entering the country. Some of the parents have already been deported and will never be able to see their children or their children see their parents or it seems like it's going to be hard for that to happen. So this is, you know, just in the news and I don't know.

[12:55]

I don't want to inflict this on your Zazen, but it's something that's a reality that's happening in our country. Child separation is not new in this country. It happened to African Americans throughout slavery. It happened to Native Americans many times, and therefore many peoples. Japanese Americans who were interred during World War II, sometimes the children were separated. And of course, in the Nazi Holocaust, children were separated from parents. And Hitler was inspired by, his concentration camps were inspired by what he studied about Native American reservations in this country. So, this is a reality. And I feel the responsibility to speak of it. And I will at the end speak of what can we do. But most of the migrants coming into this country, not all, but most of them are refugees fleeing terrible violence in places like Guatemala and Honduras and El Salvador.

[14:13]

Much of that violence inspired by United States policies, CIA sponsored coups. and the highly questionable war on drugs, which has led to cartels and violence. So people fleeing, people trying to save their children from this terrible violence, come to the American border and then they're separated from their children now. This is what's happening. So this is just one situation. And just to mention briefly a few others, there's the climate crisis, which is ongoing and increasingly dangerous, more and more dangerous. And our current government outlaws or forbids even mention of this not allowed to talk about climate in certain departments of the government.

[15:19]

And meanwhile, public lands are being turned over to fossil fuel companies, and the Arctic is being turned over to fossil fuel companies, which will increase this crisis. And there are means of alternative energy available. This is only a function of greed. The fossil fuel companies knew what they were doing in the 70s and what the result of this would be. Then there's the situation of our endless wars and our bloated military budget and the war merchants controlling our foreign policy. And also encouraging the culture of violence in our country, that we have to settle disputes through weapons, through violence. And we see the gun violence related to that. And then this week there's also the situation of the Supreme Court opening and the threat of that to all women.

[16:24]

the end of a woman's right to choose, as well as many aspects of women's health care, but also the threat to voting rights. And I can say more about the corruption involved in Justice Kennedy. retiring at this particular time. The timing was arranged by the Trump administration and Justice Kennedy's son helped Mr. Trump with money from Deutsche Bank. Anyway, so I'm talking about situations of harm. There's also wonderful things happening in this country. There's also the people who are marching this weekend. There are very fine candidates who are speaking for justice and helpfulness, who are running for office in many levels, and who are winning in many cases.

[17:29]

So again, I feel responsible. I feel it's part of my job to speak truth to power some of the time, and particularly on the Fourth of July. Our individual awareness and settling and possibility of liberation that we can realize in our deep settling in Zazen, on our own seats, is connected to the situation of suffering and of helpfulness that's possible in the world around us. So what do we do about this? And the first thing is just to keep speaking about it, at least some of the time. So that's what I'm doing. And I think it's good for people, for all of you, when you can, to talk about this stuff. And that doesn't mean to impose your ideas on others.

[18:36]

And that's not what I'm trying to do. I'm trying to speak what I see happening. But there are things to do. We can all call our contact, our Congress people and representatives, express ourselves. We can vote. And there are many young people running for office this year, important elections this year. There are many women running for office this year. This can make a big difference. There's also masses of people on the streets. And that's something that even if the pundits kind of to dismiss that, it has an effect. It had an effect on Mr. Trump at least pretending to or stopping separating children on the border. It does have an effect. And then there's also what I feel as a clergy person that there were many clergy people in Washington, DC who committed civil disobedience.

[19:44]

It's something I've done in the past, and when my health permits, I may do so again soon. There are things to do. The other side of this, though, is our bodhisattva vow. Beings are numberless. I vow to free them. Delusions are inexhaustible. I vow to end them. Dharma gates are boundless. I vow to enter them. The way of awakening is unsurpassable. Let's realize it. So the bodhisattva vow is long term. All of the things that are happening and all the difficulties, you know, things like this have been happening for a long time, and struggle against harm and harmfulness has been going on for a long time. So part of what the Bodhisattva tradition offers is a long-term

[20:48]

positive vision. Part of what our Zazen offers is a way of settling into being present and seeing this in a longer time perspective. All of the things I described are crises that are happening. They're urgent and they require strong responses and speaking up and doing whatever it is that you feel called to do to respond. But there's also the longer process, the positive vision of zazen, of settling into being present and upright for oneself and for the beings around one, the samadhi of all beings. Just doing zazen is a social practice. just doing Zazen, our awareness affects the people around us. Whether we say anything about Zazen or all of these Bodhisattva ideas or not, the talk is less important than just to be present and to be kind and to face all beings.

[22:03]

So I'll invoke, in closing, One of my teachers, Joanna Macy's three aspects of what she calls the great turning, the positive side of what's been happening all around the world in the middle of all of this destruction and harm and really this intentional cruelty of putting children in cages. I don't know what else to say about it. It's just horrible. But at the same time, many people all around the world are working, resisting, trying to build positive possible vision. And I find helpful the three aspects that Joanna Macy talks about. One of them is holding actions, just trying to limit the damage. That's all of the resistance and political work, most of what I've been talking about.

[23:05]

The other is alternative structures, building possible future models of other ways of doing things. farmers markets, organic groceries, communities like this. And the third is what we do by sitting Zazen, which is to provide a positive vision of human potential, of all beings potential, of kindness and cooperation rather than combativeness. Our bodhisattva vow has a social side, which can borrow from the American ideals of equal justice under the law. That's, of course, not an actuality in our country now. It's obviously not. African-American people have a different system of law that they have to submit to. There's still mass incarcerations and continuity of slavery and other means.

[24:10]

But the ideals that this country represents that we can still speak of And, you know, hopefully Mr. Trump won't declare himself president for life. And he's been talking about, you know, serving four terms or longer. And, you know, it's dangerous. And it's not that I hate him. I'm not, I'm not, I, you know, it's not about, making villains or enemies. It's about looking at what's going on and saying, what do we do? So, okay, that's enough. I think I've said what I wanted to say, that we have a chance through our zazen to see for ourselves how we want to respond to what's happening in the world and to not use our practice to run away from that. to not use our practice and Buddhist teaching as a way of ignoring children in cages in our country.

[25:15]

So I'll stop, but I will welcome comments, questions, responses, and happy Interdependence Day. Thank you. Yes, David. I can't hear you. There's an activist coming out recently. It came to mind that once spoke on a blog that for over close to 40,000 minutes in a month, everybody just took 15 to write a letter to someone saying, you're going to sign a loan or you're going to affect your entire family. You can take more than 15, too.

[26:20]

And you can write to Jan Schakowsky thanking her for her good at votes, too. The other thing is, you spoke to me now, it just really came up, was it's a hospice volunteer. I'm one of the people who are dying. And what I've said to the families at times is that, necessarily do all the time. We might be going through our lives just, you know, doing what we're doing, but also now we have to stop. And now we have to be kind, we have to be considerate. And in a certain way, and this is really hard for me, but in a certain way, if you look at what Trump and his supporters are doing, they're making us stop rather than getting back.

[27:32]

We try to find a way to engage in a way that we can move forward in this together. We take a step and turn it into something beautiful. Good. Thank you. Thank you. Other comments, questions, responses, please. Yes, Aisha. I think it's also important not to seem to the temptation to create good people and bad people. I think Thomas Jefferson is a great example of the ways in which Yeah, I think

[28:32]

I think when we think in terms of good and bad and right and wrong and evil, that really is not helpful. But that's what we've been trained at in our society. So that's why I'm talking about helpful and harmful, rather than bad people and good people. Because we all have positive and negative potentialities. At the same time, I think that we You know, this struggle that we're engaged in, I guess, you know, what probably largely motivated by greed on the parts of, you know, various entities is one that we've, it's not like there was some Yeah, in fact, those who are enfranchised in this country and are given the possibility of, are given helpful possibilities, that has expanded at times and contracted at other times, so it's a dynamic.

[30:08]

Yes, thank you. Yes, hi. I think we're a very big example of the wars of the century just passed, World War II specifically, and the greatness of the human virtues and abilities that were put on display in response to that. Certainly the formation of the European Union and the efforts made by the European Union and the Americans to pursue peace globally. And I think we're, we entitle ourselves to hold that Thank you, yes, that's very important that we look to, we refer to the ancestors in terms of the Bodhisattva tradition and the Zen tradition, but we can see culturally many, many people over the whole course of time who have acted and worked and done, as you said, supported creating peace, so yes.

[31:10]

Ben. I was just reminded of a story I read in the New Yorker. It's a reporter for the New Yorker who's been reporting from the El Paso district of Lawson for a long time. And there's a story about a woman from Honduras who was in a detention center. It wasn't a detention center in El Paso, I think. And she had crossed the border with her teenage son. And as soon as they crossed the border, she identified herself to a border patrol agent and said that she wanted to apply for asylum. And much to her surprise, was separated from her son and put in a detention center. And in the detention center, she started speaking with the other women in the detention center. They aren't allowed writing materials, but they're allowed one piece of paper. So they would get one piece of paper a day. And she talked with all the women in the detention center, and they tried to collect as much information as possible. about their children and their mother loved ones, their ages, where they were separated, how long they'd been separated.

[32:18]

And apparently she was an evangelical pastor, and so the other women called her la pastora and had a lot of trust in her. And she managed to get a lot of this information out of the detention center to the social service agencies that she was working with. And apparently she's being deported back to Honduras. And the reporter said that she thinks it might make it easier for her to actually reunite with her son. But she's worried about the women in the detention center. Yeah. thousands of people who are doing all this kind of work right now. Yeah, there are lots and lots of people trying to help the children and the parents who've been separated. And yet our tax dollars are being used to separate children from parents and put children in cages.

[33:24]

And it's just disgusting. Excuse me for that personal editorial. So again, there are lots of people who are working to help with this. Ben, if you can find out where those children in Chicago are, I've heard. I'm not sure where it is, but Heartland Alliance is a social service agency, has a center that was housing unaccompanied minors. There's been this ongoing problem of minors across the border. And I know that that center has also been receiving some children who have been separated from their parents. I mean, part of the horror of all of this is that the social service agencies that are doing this difficult work to help kids who are in this tragic situation end up being Just last week, a Brazilian mom succeeded in getting a judge to order the release of her teenage son, who had been separated when they crossed the border, from a detention center here in Chicago.

[34:33]

I'm not sure exactly where it is or who's being held there, but that shouldn't be that difficult to find out. They're trying to reunite unaccompanied minors and other kids with possible family members here in the U.S. who might agree to take care of them while the asylum procedures, immigration procedures go through. And I read that in order to be able to do this, for that child and somebody accompanying that child to fly to where that relative is and pay a whole bunch of other fees in order to secure the release of their child relative. And as you might imagine for a lot of immigrant families, we're talking about thousands of dollars. that they have to raise in a very short amount of time.

[35:34]

It's incredibly difficult. This is basically kidnapping and for ransom that our government is doing. So anyway, please contact your representatives. Here we are. And we can still do Zazen, and we can still find our way to Be kind, but also be aware and try and respond each in our own way.

[36:05]

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