This information caught my eye and imagination from the website Buddhist door - -
Orthodox priest Fr. Antony Hughes gave a sermon on self-compassion at his church in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In one passage he urged that we embrace the “least of the brethren.” Here he used “brethren” to describe the “hungry, lonely, imprisoned parts of ourselves we usually treat with disdain.”
Of interest to Buddhists is not only this internalization of society’s poor, lowly, and oppressed—but also the way in which Fr. Hughes proposes we deal with them. “For example, we are not angry people by nature [our italics] even though we may be prone to being angry,” he said. “The image of God in us is not angry. It is disturbed by nothing. Because the passions are not us, they can change. If we resist or deny them, they become stronger. If we meet them with compassion, we can befriend them and transformation occurs.”
“I do know that the main problem many people have in life, particularly in our culture, is that they believe they are not worthy of love. Bad theology and bad psychology often supports this false idea,” Fr. Hughes further said, invoking his studies of different schools of thought, both secular and spiritual. “Precisely because of Orthodox theology and what I have learned from the study of the world’s wisdom traditions and mindfulness-based therapies and science, I am drawn to the opposite idea.”
Orthodox priest Fr. Antony Hughes gave a sermon on self-compassion at his church in Cambridge, Massachusetts. In one passage he urged that we embrace the “least of the brethren.” Here he used “brethren” to describe the “hungry, lonely, imprisoned parts of ourselves we usually treat with disdain.”
Of interest to Buddhists is not only this internalization of society’s poor, lowly, and oppressed—but also the way in which Fr. Hughes proposes we deal with them. “For example, we are not angry people by nature [our italics] even though we may be prone to being angry,” he said. “The image of God in us is not angry. It is disturbed by nothing. Because the passions are not us, they can change. If we resist or deny them, they become stronger. If we meet them with compassion, we can befriend them and transformation occurs.”
“I do know that the main problem many people have in life, particularly in our culture, is that they believe they are not worthy of love. Bad theology and bad psychology often supports this false idea,” Fr. Hughes further said, invoking his studies of different schools of thought, both secular and spiritual. “Precisely because of Orthodox theology and what I have learned from the study of the world’s wisdom traditions and mindfulness-based therapies and science, I am drawn to the opposite idea.”
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