Why religion breeds happiness: Friends

As important as your religious beliefs may be to you, they don't necessarily make you happier, a new study in the American Sociological Review finds. What does make you more satisfied with your life, the study finds, is having friends at your congregation and a strong religious identity.

Read the rest of the story from CNN The Chart Blog.

Dharma Talk - The Precepts

Given by Hae Doh Sunim
Sunday, December 5, 2010.
Duration - 25:13

Note: If you are planning to take the precepts in April it is asked that you please listen to this Dharma Talk!

Buddhism And Science: Promise And Perils

It began 2,500 years ago in Northern India. Over the centuries it spread ever eastward. Moving south it moved into Myanmar, Thailand and Vietnam. Moving north it reached Tibet and then expanded across into China, Korea and Japan. Every culture it touched, it changed. And yet it was also changed in the process. Now it circumnavigation is complete. Buddhism has reached the west - the scientific, rational-minded west — and once again there are changes afoot. The question is what kind of changes and for whose benefit?

Read the full blog post from NPR.

Mindfulness-based therapy ‘prevents depression relapse’

Mindfulness-based cognitive therapy has the same effect as antidepressant medication for preventing relapse among patients treated for depression, say researchers.

The current standard for preventing relapse is maintenance therapy with a single antidepressant.

Read the rest of the article on Thaindian.com

Psychologist, students: Meditation an effective path to stress-relief

College students turn to a long list of activities to relax and blow off steam — working out, socializing, playing sports — the list goes on. But Christopher Willard, staff psychologist at Counseling and Mental Health Service (CMHS) and member of the board of directors at Boston's Institute for Meditation and Psychotherapy, recommends they add another, more exotic activity to that list: meditation.
The practice of meditation, according to Willard, can be quite simple, though not always easy.
"Meditation is essentially just paying attention to what is happening in the present moment and deliberately avoiding distraction," he said. "When I say paying attention to what is happening, that can mean what is happening internally in our minds and bodies or to objects and events around us."

Read the rest of the article from tuftsdaily.com here.

DVD Spotlight - Buddha Wild: Monk in a Hut

Buddhist monks aren’t usually described as wild(at least not in our urban dictionary), but director Anna Wilding’s intriguing feature documentary debut stirs up the meditation room a bit. Buddha Wild explores what really goes on behind the monastery doors, touching on hot-button issues like the roles of women, racism, and celibacy in a monk’s daily life. Buddha Wild is a refreshing synthesis of Eastern and Western politics and culture, without a nibble of Hollywood cheese.

“The religion of the future should transcend a personal God and avoid dogma and theology. Covering both natural and spiritual, it should be based on a religious sense arising from the experience of all things natural and spiritual as a meaningful unity. Buddhism answers this description… If ever there is any religion that would cope with modern scientific needs it would be Buddhism.” – Einstein.

Buddha Wild provides viewers with a well-judged glimpse into the monastery world of the Buddhist Monk and the real world of those who follow the precepts and principals of Buddhism. The documentary centers on the life of the Buddhist monks. They are a kind lot of warm hearted and enlightened men. Buddha Wild is a journey of discovery.

The monks were clearly enamored by Ms. Wilding and their generosity of information from taboo subjects exhibits this fact. A well judged mix of seriousness and humor. “Anna Wilding was compelled to make this upbeat film to counteract racism she witnessed in a region”.

6 Other Reasons to Meditate

Meditation isn't just for relaxing. Here are six other benefits. Why meditate? Outside of religious contexts, the most common reason is stress management. But as these latest research findings demonstrate, meditation is much more than just a relaxation technique. Here are a half-dozen more good reasons to take up meditation.

See all 6 reasons from Psychology Today

The Case Against Buying Christmas Presents

From Zen Habits:

I love Christmas. I love the snow-themed everything, even when I was living on tropical Guam, and Santa and elves and reindeer and snowmen and candy canes. Yes, I even love the non-stop playing of Christmas music for two months.
Most of all, I love getting together with my family — eating Christmas cookies, singing Christmas carols together, gossiping and laughing at each other. It’s tremendous fun.
I don’t love Christmas shopping, or the overconsumption, frenzied malls, consumer debt, environmental waste, wasted time wrapping, and over-accumulation of needless stuff that goes with it.
Bah humbug! I love Christmas, but the shopping has got to go. Here’s why. Warning: This will be a rant of near-epic proportions.

Continue reading here.

Buddhism and Love

One of the things that I adore most about Christianity is how love is at its very centre. Jesus summed up his message and teaching in the commandments to love God, to love you neighbour (and he talked a lot about just who your neighbour is) and to love yourself (Matthew 22:36-40), and Paul, the first great leader of the early church, placed love at the very pinnacle of Christian life, even above faith (1 Corinthians 13:13).

I wonder if love’s being so central to Christianity explains why the word is so rarely used by many Buddhist writers writing in English. After all there is a tendency, especially in many of the Buddhist blogs and articles I come across, to want to make clear distinctions between Buddhism, the adopted religion of the writer, and Christianity, often the religion left behind.

But not all Buddhist teachers are shy of the word, and two that come instantly to mind are my own root teacher Seon Master Daehaeng Sunim, and another Zen Master, Thich Nhat Hahn. Thich Nhat Hahn writes: “Do we need to love our teacher? Do we need to love our disciples? Do we need to love our Dharma brothers and sisters in order to succeed in our practice? The answer is, yes.”

Continue reading from Wake Up and Laugh

Cosmic Rebirth

Circular patterns in the universe's pervasive background radiation suggest the Big Bang was only the latest of many

Most cosmologists trace the birth of the universe to the Big Bang 13.7 billion years ago. But a new analysis of the relic radiation generated by that explosive event suggests the universe got its start eons earlier and has cycled through myriad episodes of birth and death, with the Big Bang merely the most recent in a series of starting guns.

Read more at Science News.org