Blog

In the news: “Gather Offers Relief for Loneliness”

Gather offers relief for hunger and loneliness Addison Independent November 30, 2023   ‘Gather’ offers relief for hunger & loneliness GATHER AT 48 Merchants Row in Middlebury hosted a Thanksgiving dinner last Thursday for around 60 people, many of them houseless and/or struggling with other challenges. Pictured here, from left,

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This month at Bread Loaf Mountain Zen: The Buddha’s Awakening

This week we join Buddhists worldwide in commemorating the Buddha’s awakening by entering deep retreat both in our temple and at Gather. Giving ourselves completely to retreat we gift ourselves with a chance to remember that the human heart cannot cut itself off from the world. Our deepest nature is relationship, belonging to all

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December Note from Gather

Our first Thanksgiving at Gather was very special. You can read about it in this really nice article in our local newspaper. This fall we saw a new tent encampment pop up in the downtown of Middlebury. It created a bit of a stir when some of the people living

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Message from Board Member Colleen Jishu Brown

Community-Engaged Zen practice can take so many forms. For me, one of the ways is to serve on the board of directors at Bread Loaf Mountain Zen Community. I’ve done this since the beginning of BLMZC in 2017, when the idea of a physical Zen center in our community was

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Infinite Circle 2: Ministry

Outcomes and Competencies (in no particular order) Ministerial self-awareness and demeanor; understanding projections and leadership dynamics Understanding how one’s one story intersects with the stories of others; being aware of one’s biases, culture and power dynamic. Foundationally based in the Buddhist tradition, specifically in the Zen Peacemaker Three Tenets and

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Blurred Vision and Love

I was recently asked to articulate my vision for Gather and Bread Loaf Mountain Zen Community. I hesitated for a minute, experiencing a little glitch in my brain. I had two thoughts bumping into each other: one centered around the traditional settings of Dharma talks, rituals, robes, and Dogen workshops,

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