Dharma Flower Sangha

“There is an intimate connection between birth and death. Without the one, we cannot have the other. As it says in the gospel, unless the seed dies, it could never bear fruit.

We have a tendency to think of death as something very negative, dark, and painful. But it’s not like that. Death is essential to making life possible. Death is transformation. Death is continuation. When we die, something else is born, even if it takes time to reveal itself or for us to be able to recognize it. There may be some pain at the moment of dying, just as there is pain at the moment of birth, or when the first bud bursts through the bark of a tree in spring. But once we know that death is not possible without the birth of something else, we are able to bear the pain. We need to look deeply to recognize the new that manifests when something else dies.”  The Art of Living, by Thich Nhat Hanh

MEDITATION, TONIGHT, JANUARY 11, 2024. Please join us at Phap Hoa Temple, 85 Prospect St. Rockville-Vernon, CT. 7:30 pm, every Thursday.