The following article from ‘Tricycle’ surprises me not one bit. This publication is very squarely in the ‘California Zen’ tradition, as I call it. (I think Foucault got there first, in his later days of acid trips and bath house adventuring).
By this I mean the tendency to find American Buddhists in leafy neighbourhoods, where they have abundant detached houses with at least one room set aside for soft furnishings, thangkas featuring Manjushri, salt lamps and Bang & Olofson stereos to om along to. Self-righteous, my body is my temple types.
A short postscript to illustrate that, alas, California Zen is very pervasive. Several months ago, possibly last year, I attended a Zoom talk featuring Bhikkhu Bodhi. He’s a big deal in the Theravada world because of his awesome scholarship. Several of the authoritative volumes of Pali Discourses were translated by him.
The talk was okay… right up until he started to wax political about the deluded souls who argue against the wisdom of Dr Anthony Fauci. He was very careful to drop the name in this Full Name And Title awed respect mode.
Gullible fool.