Buddhist women – Feminism and Religion

Are Buddhist Women Happy? Part II by Oxana Poberejnaia

In Part I of this post I started asking questions about whether Buddhism in the West is part of patriarchy. Today I offer a possible link between practices of men’s Initiation Rites and some of the elements of Buddhism.

Men’s Initiation Rites

When we consider principle practices of Western Buddhists, primarily daily meditation and meditation retreats we might enquire something like this: since monastic practice is a model for our Western lay practice, do Buddhist monasteries constitute an extension and continuation of men’s long houses, places of men’s initiation rites?

Continue reading “Are Buddhist Women Happy? Part II by Oxana Poberejnaia”

Are Buddhist Women Happy? by Oxana Poberejnaia

The basic question is the same as in a “A Bit of Fry and Laurie” sketch about a sour-faced champion car racer: “Are you happy?” Are we, Buddhist women, happy with Buddhism? Are Buddhist men happy with the position of Buddhist women? Are we happy with the legacy we are leaving for future generations of Buddhist men and women?

This question can be re-phrased as: Are we happy because we should be happy? Because if we are unhappy it is our failure as women? Or as Buddhist practitioners? Are we happy to keep other people happy?

Do these questions sound familiar? – Are these the same questions that women have to deal with anyway, in this patriarchal society we live in? Continue reading “Are Buddhist Women Happy? by Oxana Poberejnaia”

From Bihar, India—The Thirteenth Sakyadhita Conference by Rita M. Gross

Above and all around us is a blue and white stripped fabric tent, as, about 250 strong, we participants in Sakyadhita’s Thirteenth Conference on Buddhist Women, shiver in the cold, listening to a wide variety of papers about women and Buddhism. We are meeting in Vaishali, in Bihar, India, at a Vietnamese nunnery that was recently founded at the place where Mahaprajapati, the first Buddhist nun, was ordained. She is a great hero to many Buddhist women for her persistence about receiving formal ordination as a nun, thus founding an institution that has endured for some 2,500 years in various parts of Asia, and now in the West as well, so it is fitting that we should meet here. The nunnery complex is still incomplete and under construction, which is one reason why we are meeting, essentially, in the outdoors. The thin fabric walls over little protection from the coldest winter in north India in forty years. That was not part of the planning for this event! So everyone, speakers and participants alike, wear all the layers of clothing we have, and cheerfully practice patience. It is quite a sight! Continue reading “From Bihar, India—The Thirteenth Sakyadhita Conference by Rita M. Gross”