Patriarch Ou-I is my favourite commentator on the Pure Land canon. His thought is that of a true mystic’s.

“Many sutras teach Pure Land practices of various kinds: contemplating the image of Buddha, contemplating the concept of Buddha, doing prostrations, making offerings, practicing the five forms of repentance and the six forms of mindfulness, and so on. If you consummate any of these practices, and dedicate the merits toward rebirth in the Pure Land, you will be born there. The method of reciting the Buddha-name is the one that is all-inclusive, embracing people of all mentalities and the one that is easiest to practice. This is why the compassionate one, Sakyamuni Buddha, explained it to Shariputra without being asked. Reciting the Buddha-name can be called the number one expedient among all the expedient methods, the supreme complete truth among all the complete truths, the most perfect of all the perfect teachings.”

“Infinite light extends through space in all directions; infinite life extends through time and reaches through past, present, and future. The dimensions of space and time interpenetrating are the body of the universe. This body as a whole is the body and land of Amitabha, and this body as a whole is the name of Amitabha.

Thus, Amitabha is the inherently enlightened True Nature of sentient beings, and reciting the name of Amitabha reveals this enlightenment. Inherent enlightenment and the enlightenment as it is revealed through cultivation and realization are fundamentally not two different aspects, just as sentient beings and Buddhas are not two different things. Thus, if we are in accord with our inherently enlightened true nature for a moment, we are Buddhas for a moment, and if we are in accord with our inherently enlightened true nature moment after moment, we are Buddhas moment after moment.”

“‘Amitabha Buddha attained enlightenment ten eons ago.‘

The life span of Amitabha Buddha is infinite, and here when the sutra just speaks of ten eons, this is just a provisional way of teaching. In fact Amitabha’s time has been endless, and he has urged, is urging, and will urge all the sentient beings of the past, present, and future to quickly seek birth in the Pure Land, share in the infinite life of the Buddhas, and accomplish this all in one lifetime.”

Of course, I am a Mahayana Buddhist because I think it offers sentient beings the greatest spiritual freedom. I would not be a Mahayanist if I did not believe this. I am able to embrace the skilful means of the Name, without having to explain away other wisdoms and traditions of the world as “false” or the works of an evil, divisive force. There are aspects of the Name in everything. Through the Name’s skilful means, I can see his words engraved on every tradition that honours its ageless principles of compassion, love, and insight. It is true freedom to devote one’s life to Amitabha, and the next, and the next, and with one’s bodhisattvahood, reveal the Name to the myriad suffering beings in the many universes scattered throughout the fabrics of reality. This awareness of one’s “debt” to a higher power, to the Presence, is accepted in many faiths. The very name of Islam means “submission” - submission to what is truly real. St. Paul writes of freedom through subservience to Christ - where one loses nothing and receives from Christ a hundredfold through one’s obedience. In a similar way, so too does the Presence of the Name permeate a single blade of grass with enlightenment, in which samsara is already liberated - it only needs to remember, to re-awaken itself to the sacred, holy syllables of “Namo Amitabha Buddha.”

I have long been fascinated by the Name, which is perhaps what draws me to Pure Land, a tradition that reveals the Presence of Amitabha through the Name. Many people contemplate and wonder about what they call the Divine, and why. Many call him God. Many others call her Goddess. Some express it through the sacred name Yahweh, or Jesus Christ, or Allah. Speaking from a Pure Land perspective, I simply use “the Name” interchangeably with Amitabha, the Buddha, the Presence, and the Nature. With my sutras and my prayer beads, I invoke and commune thus:

1.  the Name

2. Amitabha Buddha

3. the Buddha

4. the Presence

5. the Nature

These are my five names of the inconceivable Name. What are yours?

The Nature is present in all things. It dwells in every breathing creature. It is dormant in every fluttering heart that beats with life in this universe. The Nature is that of the Buddha, the latent potentiality of supreme, unsurpassed enlightenment and bliss. This is a truth that must always be proclaimed for those who teach, counsel, or are involved in personal development. We must remember these cardinal points:

“When another person makes you suffer, it is because he suffers deeply within himself, and his suffering is spilling over. He does not need punishment; he needs help. That’s the message he is sending.” - Thich Nhat Hahn

“Deep down, no one is unworthy.”

“The Nature is within all.”

“Sometimes it’s not just good or bad. It just is. Turn it into good, for the sake of enlightening others.”

“Buddha Nature reveals itself in many aspects: Gods, titans, lesser divinities. They all point to the Nature, to the Name.”

I am not a Catholic, but I have read many of Pope Benedict XVI’s works, and read them thoroughly. I have a respect for his depth of thought, clarity in communicating theological ideas, and his unusual combination of scholarly crispness and poetic expression. In some places I do think he grows a little vague and generalizes the opinions of others, and although I disagree with him on many points about religion and ethics, I am a “reader” of Pope Benedict XVI - perhaps more so than any other Christian author except for my favourite Catholic monk: Thomas Merton.

An interesting passage from the Pope is his warning against living as if there was no God, that is, living life disregarding religion as a part of life and not as the ground of life itself. I would agree with this very general assertion since religion tacked on to life is more of a gimmick or an escape from boredom or misery, whilst life lived through authentic, mindful (and not fanatic or close-minded) religion is true life. Here, I would like to bold a sentence that, to me, speaks of the Pope’s implicit affirmation of a Buddhist truth that goes “beyond” God:

‘Theology must go back to being truly “theo-logy,” speaking about and with God. The one necessity (unum necessarium) of man is God. Everything changes, whether God exists or not. Unfortunately, we Christians also often live as if God did not exist (”si Deus non daretur“). We often live according to the slogan: “God does not exist, and if he exists he does not belong”‘ (Moynihan, 2005, p. 88).

Everything changes - no contingent things are permanent or last in themselves. This is the fact that Buddhism takes as a basic doctrine of its philosophy and no matter how one chooses to speak of God, gods, or anything else, one must first acquaint and familiarize oneself with impermanence. Knowing impermanence cultivates courage, open-mindedness, wisdom, and compassion. Impermanence, as envisaged in the Buddhist teachings, is a universal spiritual truth that all spiritual leaders, including the Pope, have no choice but to acknowledge. Does this make spirituality an exercise in futility? Does it render the idea of God powerless? Or does the truth of impermanence point toward something higher, something greater than the travails that we project onto this universe?

One cannot transcend life if one does not first know what it is. In the first place this transcendence is not a negating of life, but a completion of it - a completion of many kalpas of practice and what can be nothing less than living. Let us put this into perspective:

There are four different lengths of kalpas. A regular kalpa is approximately 16 million years long (16,798,000 years), and a small kalpa is 1000 regular kalpas, or 16 billion years. A medium kalpa is 320 billion years, the equivalent of 20 small kalpas. A great kalpa is 4 medium kalpas, or 1.28 trillion years.

From this all-too-brief overview, it is evident that Buddhism is a religion about living - and living a lot. The question is how to ensure that all this living is humane, gentle, and full of love and meaning? I would like to reiterate Venerable Master Hsing Yun’s approach to this issue:

“Buddhism, dismissed as passive and world-weary, is on the decline because in looking for deliverance from existence, it overlooks issues arising from existence. Truly, how can Buddhism be accepted by society, if it departs from the reality of life and becomes unpatriotic, unfilial, and unfriendly?” (Fu Chi-ying, 1996, p. 154).

A Buddhist is a vehicle first for the living, and then for the dead. It is the living that need Buddhism most urgently. Only by attending to the living with our full strength can we attend to the dead competently.