Living Buddha, Living Christ, Thich Nhat Hanh

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What do I love about: Living Budha Living Christ?

When you are a truly happy Christian, you are also a Buddhist. And vice versa.

Buddha and Christ, perhaps the two most pivotal figures in the history of humankind, each left behind a legacy of teachings and practices that have shaped the lives of billions of people over the course of two millennia. If they were to meet on the road today, what would each think of the other’s spiritual views and practices.

Thich Nhat Hanh has been part of a decades- long dialogue between the two greatest living contemplative traditions, and brings to Christianity an appreciation of its beauty that could be conveyed only by an outsider. In a lucid, meditative prose, he explores the crossroads of compassion and holiness at which the two traditions meet, and reawakens our understanding of both. “On the altar in my hermitage,” he says, “ are images of Buddha and Jesus, and I touch both of them as my spiritual ancestors.

What do I not love about: Living Budha Living Christ?

Zilch

Who should read: Living Budha Living Christ?

Like me, if you are curious about religious dichotomy especially between Christianity and Budhism, this book will help bridge that gap and reveal how similar both religions are.

Who should not read: Living Budha Living Christ?

If you are a religious bigot it may be difficult to convince you to read this.

Notes from Living Budha Living Christ? 

• For whoever has not known himself know nothing, but he who has known himself has already understood the depth of all things
• Mindfulness is very much like the Holy Spirit. Both of them help us touch the ultimate dimension of reality. Mindfulness helps us touch NIRVANA, and the holy spirit offers us a door to the Trinity
• To LOVE our enemy is impossible, because the moment we love him, he is no longer our enemy.
• If you practise when you are not experiencing difficulty, it will be easier to go back to your island of self when the need is great.
• Concerning that which cannot be talked about, we should not say anything.
• Let us avow that he surpasses all power of human speech, that he eludes the grasp of every mortal intelligence that the angels cannot penetrate him, not the seraphim see him in full clarity, nor the cherubim fully understand him. For he is invisible to the principalities and powers, the virtues of all creatures without exception, only the son and the Holy spirit know him.
• Craving, anger, doubt, fear and forgiveness are what block the light, so practice to remove these five hindrances.
• The best way to take  care of the future is to take care of the present moment.