Shared Stewardship

An Ongoing Class and Exploration

Led by Reverend Tom Dharma-Joy Reichert
Sundays: March 30, April 27, May 18 & June 22

1:30-4:00 p.m.

“A study series for anyone interested in co-creating the future of ZCLA or learning how to live a life of intentional relationship.”

(Zoom & In-person – REGISTER BELOW)

CLASS INFO

In June 2001, not long after Roshi Egyoku was installed at ZCLA’s third abbot, ZCLA embarked on an investigation into the practice of Shared Stewardship.  Shared Stewardship is a radical reorientation from a hierarchical and transactional model of spiritual practice to a more horizontal one, where the Sangha is co-creating and co-responsible for our practice, thus creating the space for collective wisdom and collective awakening to manifest.

While Shared Stewardship is an identified Core Practice of ZCLA, has it been transmitted to the vast majority of members who have joined since that first exploration over two decades ago?  Is Shared Stewardship an accurate description of how we actually function, or is it just a phrase, words on a page?  No need to navel gaze – in this Year of the Snake, let’s shed the old and renew our commitment to this transformational practice!

In this series, we go “back to basics.”  In 2024, we spent several months going over ZCLA’s history and current financial and organizational structure, and the assessing the ZCLA’s current strengths and gaps as to Shared Stewardship.  In 2025, we will closely study Dogen Zenji’s Tenzo Kyokun, the Instructions to the Tenzo (Head Cook), which offers a model of how to practice together in community.  We will also look at “Instructions to the Cook:  Living a Life That Matters,” a book by Roshi Bernie Glassman and Rick Fields that uses Dogen Zenji’s text as a jumping off point to vastly expand the “community” to include the whole world.

We will meet more-or-less monthly to explore together.  This offering is intended to help train us all as Bodhisattvas and to orient us to carry Zen Center forward – together – into the future.  We are all co-creating it together, whether we are conscious of that fact or not.  This invites you to do so more consciously and to shift your perspective and relationship to practice and to one another.  Will you join us?

Zoom & In-person Participants:

Members: $30/class; $150/Fulltime

Non-Members: $40/class; $200/Fulltime

The Zen Center policy is to turn no one away for lack of funds. If you have concerns about payments click here to request Dharma Training Fund. If you have any other questions, please contact Myoki at programsteward@zcla.org.

REGISTRATION & PAYMENT