Bearing Witness to Life on the Street

A Zen Pilgrimage

Led by Sensei Jitsujo Gauthier & Roshi Mark Kizan Shogen Angyo Bloodgood 

3:00 pm PST Thursday, October 30-12:00 pm PST Sunday, November 2

In-person Only

“When we go to bear witness to life on the streets, we’re offering ourselves. Not blankets, not food, not clothes, just ourselves.”

~Bernie Glassman, Bearing Witness

 

EVENT INFO

WHAT IS A STREET RETREAT?

A street retreat is a plunge into the unknown. It is an opportunity to go beyond our imagined limits. It’s the barest poke at renunciation, surrender, and letting go. By bearing witness to life on the streets, we begin to see our prejudices, privileges, and boundaries more directly, recognize our common humanness, as well as the many nonhuman and nonsentient beings that we are dependent on. It is a way to experience pilgrimage, interconnection and realize our responsibilities. Click here for more about street retreats with the Zen Peacemakers.

 

Bearing Witness to Life on the Streets: Los Angeles

This is a street retreat in which we will have the opportunity to bear witness to life on the streets of Los Angeles. Each day we will pilgrimage through the city, ride the bus, eat at soup kitchens, sit, walk, rest, practice council, chant, and engage in begging practice. At the end of the day we will sleep on the grounds of a temple, church or Dharma center. We will bring our presence as an offering to all that we encounter along with a few simple items.

 

Important consideration: We will have an early October planning meeting via zoom to talk about logistics, what to bring and not bring, etc., e.g, we will walk for much of the day so wear comfortable shoes, bring a backpack to carry your things, dress in layers, etc.

 

EVENT STEWARDS

Sensei Jitsujo T. Gauthier is a Zen priest and preceptor at the Zen Center of Los Angeles, as well as a member of the Zen Peacemakers International. She received Dharma Transmission (denbo) from Roshi Egyoku in 2024. She is also an Assistant Professor and current Chair of the Buddhist Chaplaincy department at University of the West in Los Angeles County. She explores and practices of the Three Tenets in the classroom, chaplaincy work, as well as within seated meditation.

 

 

Rōshi Mark Kizan Shōgen Angyo Bloodgood

Raised in the Episcopal Church, Rōshi Shōgen aspired to become an Episcopal priest in his youth. But in the late 1960s and early ’70s, a “subtle feeling” nudged him toward the spiritual teachings of the East. This quiet shift began with Hermann Hesse’s Siddhartha, and deepened through the writings of Shunryū Suzuki, Philip Kapleau, Huston Smith, Alan Watts, and D.T. Suzuki. During this formative period, he studied religion, existentialism, and Buddhism at California State University, Northridge.

For decades, Shōgen considered himself a “closet intellectual Buddhist.” But on his 50th birthday, during a camping trip in Big Sur, an article in Tricycle magazine reignited his practice. Inspired, he sought a teacher and found his way to the Zen Center of Los Angeles in 1999, where he became a student of Rōshi Egyoku Nakao.

His formal Zen path unfolded over the next two decades: receiving Jukai in 2005, Tokudo in 2012, Denkai in 2016, Dharma Holder empowerment in 2019, Dharma Transmission in December 2019, and Inka Shōmei in December 2025.

Rōshi Shōgen has led the San Luis Obispo Zen Circle for over 20 years. He also leads a prison sangha at the California Men’s Colony, where he offers weekly services, meditation, and Dharma talks. He recently retired from his work as a hospice chaplain.

He is a member of the White Plum Asanga, the Zen Peacemakers, the American Zen Teachers Association, and an associate member of the Soto Zen Buddhist Association.

Active in the interfaith community, Shōgen participates in the San Luis Obispo Ministerial Association and Opening Doors of Interfaith Understanding.

He lives in Los Osos, California, with his wife, Karla.

 

EVENT FEE

Mala: $150 Participants are asked to raise a Mala. Click here. for Information about Mala-raising practice. 2/3s of the Mala funds collected will be distributed to support local soup kitchens and relief organizations that we encounter during the retreat – this will be collectively decided by participants; 1/3rd of the funds will go to Zen Center of Los Angeles for administration expenses and to support ongoing service work outside the temple gates. Participants are encourage to lean into any discomfort around asking for money, help, and inviting family, friends, coworkers, etc. into your spiritual practice. Mala donations can be submitted directly to ZCLA.

REGISTRATION

Click here to register.

Questions? Email Jitsujo (jitsujo8@gmail.com) or Shogen (shogen@slozc.org).