The Muse and the Spirit

Well, it has been quite a while... I have been neglecting this weblog - too many other good things, plus the advent of Facebook as an alternative, but here I am back again. This interlude has seen quite a few developments. We are currently much concerned with preparations for
the 5th Living Buddhism Conference, called "Breaking the Mould". Do come along... [pdf booking form]. This seems like a continuation of a number of trends discernable here at Amida Trust and, I think, elsewhere too. As we have become more close knit as a community we have also been spreading out into activities many of which are concerned with the arts and spirituality. The advent of the Maitri Project a bit over a year ago, which we saw as a spearhead for socially engaged work on our doorstep in Leicester, has proved also to be a springboard for arts related activities that become an increasing energy centre for us. This week Prasada and I have presented a session at St James' Church in Picadilly in London which is a centre with a strong interest in interfaith harmony. I feel that these activities - arts, inter-faith - are not just local interests of our own. My intuition is that while on the one hand there is an increasing level of government control in more and more aspects of life there is simultaneously, and perhaps as a kind of reaction, a struggle going on for expression of the free spirit - whether that spirit is "spiritual" or artistic or in some other domain of culture. All of this fits together very conguently for us since the notion of "Other Power" in Pureland Buddhism orients us directly to inspiration that cuts through the conventional. The notion of Breaking the Mould refers both to overturning the old and to the pains of birth, but all this speaks of creativity and "going beyond".