Sumeru News

Wow, I can't believe it has been six months since my last blog post. 2023 is done and dusted, with more than $6000 going to Buddhist centres or charities, including the Mississippi-Madawaska Land Trust and the Ottawa Food Bank, in addition to author royalties. Titles on tap for 2024 include: Kalyanamitra, volume II, dealing with praxis for Buddhist chaplains in a variety of settings, by Monica Sanford Buddhist Chaplaincy for Colleges and Universities, edited by JiHyang Padma, Sumi Loundon Kim, and John Makransky Un sentier interieur, a pocket introduction to Buddhism for inmates in the Québec prison system, by Acharya...

Here’s what’s been going on in my little corner of the Kalachakra mandala… Monica Sanford (Harvard Divinity School) has just sent me the final manuscript for the first seven chapters of volume II of Kalyanamitra: A Model for Buddhist Spiritual Care (on praxis in any spiritual care context, with finalized contributions from other authors for subsequent chapters to follow later this month). Now I’m editing. Jy Hyang Padma (Tufts University) is in the initial stages of putting together a book on Buddhist spiritual care written specifically for chaplains in post-secondary educational institutions. She is currently developing a detailed table of...

LIVING NEMBUTSU: Applying Shinran’s Radically Engaged Buddhism in Life and Society -- Jeff Wilson https://sumeru-books.com/products/living-nembutsu and ENGAGED BUDDHISM IN JAPAN: Historical Perspectives and Contemporary Exemplars -- Jonathan S. Watts Volume 1 An Engaged Buddhist History of Japan from Its Origins to the Dawn of the 21st Century https://sumeru-books.com/products/engaged-buddhism-in-japan-volume-1

Phew! Year-end is done. I'm happy to report that this year Sumeru authors and I were able to donate more than $3830 dollars to charities, including the Vancouver Food Bank, CARES animal shelter, the Gaden Phodrang Foundation, Karuna Canada, Buddhist Global Relief, Red Cross Ukrainian Relief, and a variety of temples and Zen centers. Bowing.

Nick Hunt, whose collection of short stories we published earlier this year (https://sumeru-books.com/products/loss-soup-and-other-stories) was recently interviewed in Resurgence & Ecologist magazine about how fiction, his stories, and the larger work of the Dark Mountain collective, are a way to grapple with the hyperobject that is ecosystem collapse and extinction. You can read the article here: https://www.resurgence.org/magazine/article6073-a-darkening-terrain.html