Priest in the Church of England. Father, husband, son. Keen biker.

Category: buddhism

Free Tibet

Cleaning up before the torch - photo by SouthbankSteve'sYesterday I was far too caught up with organising Over the Air to even notice that our country, and the city in which I live, had decided to bend over and allow the Olympic Torch to be carried around, held aloft proud and strong, surrounded by Chinese security and police officers on bikes.

So it’s with some satisfaction this morning that I’ve had  a quick look around and seen the people have made their voices heard, that demonstrations went ahead, and that despite a ‘ring of steel’ around the torch several attempts were made to take the torch and even put it out with a fire extinguisher. 

It’s made me proud to see that even whilst our ineffective prime minister is unwilling to raise the question of Tibet in any meaningful manner with the Chinese, the people of the UK and other countries feel able to make themselves heard in London. 

Read more about Tibet, and why we should put pressure on our Government to do something about it, rather than saying it’s okay to torture and take over someone else’s country with impunity.

 Everyday I head into work and see the Olympic flag flying proudly over the site of the last location in this country to hold the games, it makes me sick that the ideals it’s supposed to hold in the highest esteem don’t count if you have enough money or are enough of a threat to make them go away.

Why Buddhism?

There’s always been a connection between biking and Buddhism. I can’t explain exactly what it is, but as I grow older, as I spend more time navigating the streets and avenues of this life, I continually find myself bumping against blockages and and dead ends confined, and defined (that wasn’t mean to rhyme) by organised religion.

Why must I live my life defined by strict rules that where set out 100s of years ago, why must I think every-time I turn around what it is that God wants me to do.

I watched Tribe last week and saw as a monk explained that we all have within us the ability to make our lives what we want it to be. Nothing to do with a greater being, but if you’re good to others and work hard, if you believe in yourself and work towards making your dreams a reality; you can attain those goals.

So now I’m exploring what it is that drives us. What is it that makes us want more? Is it ‘more’? Or is it that we want to attain a comfortable level existance. If we look at Maslow’s hierachy of needs we see that, right there at the bottom are the basic needs, the things that simply make us tick… at what point in our lives do we move beyond those basic needs and start to look for wider meanings?

Is it possible to bury ones head until these things go away and you allow yourself to blindly believe…. should you ever allow yourself to blindly believe?

There’s no easy answers to any of these questions, but I believe, blindly or not, that we must strive to answer them. That we must take our time to ask, examine, and explore the issues surrounding these thoughts, and that we must, move forward from strict doctrine that so binds and harms the world in which we live.