Category: News

As we navigate the ongoing pandemic, social and political change, within the Issan-ji temple walls the Hartford Street Zen Center Winter Light Retreat Sesshin will begin Friday, December 4th, including the Rohatsu celebration/ceremony; and concludes on Sunday, December 6th, mid-day. Thursday the 3rd of December evening there will be an orientation as well. We offer this schedule to join and are sharing the full routine schedule you’ve known in the past and some suggestions for creating your at home sacred Zendo and Buddha hall space. You can apply more retreat time, self directed, using our usual schedule, or follow our in-temple retreat schedule for 2020 and in both cases please join us online when Issan-ji resident students and priests log on. As always, the Hartford Street Zen Center relies on both your participation, but also your generous donations. We know we aren’t providing space and food this year to the community, but we still humbly request your generosity for this annual event. Please click here for the schedule and additional information. Suggested Virtual Attendance is $30 per day – or – an amount of your own choosing.  Login links for virtual attendance: * Thursday night instruction 7:30pm through 8:30pm– click here * Friday, Saturday 6am through 7am Service/Chanting – click here * Friday, Saturday 10:15am through 11:50am Chanting – click here ***Talk will begin at 10:30am*** *Friday, Saturday 6pm through 8:30pm Refuges– click here * Sunday 6am through 12 noon (6am-7am service, 10:15am to 11:40am preparation and then Bodhi day ceremony, but zoom open whole entire 6am to noon time slot) – click here Chant book pages for Service/Chanting here (updated 12/5/2020 @noon)

Please join us for a Dharma talk by Rev. Tim, priest-ordained in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki-rōshi, and who is a longtime leader in the Bay Area Recovery community, as well as a skilled instructor in the practice of sewing Buddhist Dharma robes. Born in Utah and raised in London, Gengyoko Tim Wicks studied fine art at San Francisco State University and received his MFA with distinction from California College of Arts and Crafts. He studied for four years with Spirit Rock teacher Eugene Cash and was a steering committee member of the Insight Meditation Community of San Francisco.

Saturday mornings we offer a Zoom web conferencing for video and/or audio presence for the scheduled events. 9:25 zazen (you can log into the conference starting at 9am to socialize) and a Dharma talk at ~9:45am, followed by Q&A as well as an opportunity to check in and see how you are doing. Please click here to be routed to our Zoom gathering.

Please join us this Saturday morning for a Dharma talk by Rev. Ryuei, Michael McCormick, who was ordained to the Nichiren-shū (Lotus Sutra School) ministry in 2001 by Rev. Ryusho Matsuda, of the San Jose Nichiren Temple.

Rev. McCormick is also a long-time practitioner of zazen (seated meditation) and a student of the writings of Dōgen-zenji.

Saturday mornings we offer a Zoom web conferencing for video and/or audio presence for the scheduled events. 9:25 zazen (you can log into the conference starting at 9am to socialize) and a Dharma talk at ~9:45am, followed by Q&A as well as an opportunity to check in and see how you are doing. Please click here to be routed to our Zoom gathering.

Please connect in friendship here:

https://www.instagram.com/mitrasabha.hszcfriends/?igshid=igk9ic0o3wbe

And join us for a social distance masked holiday social opportunity. See the details below:

Kokyo currently residing in Crestone, Colorado has served as Head Teacher at Santa Cruz Zen Center. He has been practicing zen since 1990 in residence at Tassajara, Green Gulch Farm, No Abode Hermitage in Mill Valley, and Bukkokuji Monastery in Japan. He was ordained a priest in 1994 by Tenshin Anderson Roshi and received Dharma Transmission from him in 2010.

Kokyo’s interests include looking at how the classic original teachings of Buddha-Dharma from ancient India, China, and Japan are still very much alive and useful in present-day America to bring peace and harmony to this troubled world.

You may join the Zoom meeting for meditation any time starting at 9 a.m. for socializing and to check-in on how you are doing. Zazen begins at 9:25 a.m. followed by the Dharma talk at ~ 9:45am, followed by Q&A as well as an another opportunity to check in and see how you are doing. Please click here to be routed to our Zoom gathering.

Please visit the following words from the virtual temple to you:

http://hosted-p0.vresp.com/651156/5a0213c2f4/ARCHIVE

Please visit this page for the most recent and up to date Zoom information – https://hszc.org/2020/04/18/online-sangha/

Zesho Susan O’Connell is a Zen teacher with 30 years of meditation experience. She has lived at San Francisco Zen Center since 1995, was ordained as a Zen priest in 1999 by Tenshin Reb Anderson, was Shuso (head student) in 2004, and received Dharma Transmission in 2016.

She has served in many key positions at SF Zen Center, including as Vice President and President from 2006-2016. She is currently Spiritual Director of the Zen-inspired Senior Living Community Project. Before moving into SF Zen Center, Susan had a full work life. As a young woman she was an actress in L.A. and New York and starred in a dozen television shows, and several feature films. After that, she started, with two other partners, her own business as an independent feature film producer with offices in San Francisco and L.A., and continued that business for 25 years.

She produced four award-winning feature films, and one TV movie and has been involved with dozens of development projects. She has consulted with filmmakers around the world on how to develop stories and raise private investment capital for movies. She can’t seem to stop her involvement in film and has helped to produce over 10 video/film projects about SF Zen Center and its teachers. She is a mother and a grandmother (which she does not consider to be “work”).

You may join the Zoom meeting for meditation any time starting at 9 a.m. Zazen begins at 9:25 a.m. followed by the Dharma talk. The link is: https://zoom.us/j/167153141