Karma Chameleon: From Zen Practitioner to Episcopal Bishop

"The lay ordination was a welcoming rite for me to commit myself to the path to discover why I suffer or why other people suffer,” Rev. Kevin Thew Forrester told the Times of London shortly after his election as bishop of the Episcopal Diocese of Northern Michigan on February 21. Forrester went on to explain that he took jukai—the lay ordination rite of Zen Buddhism—“[T]o use the practice of meditation to help that suffering.”

These days Forrester’s practice is being mightily tested. His embrace of Zen meditation has riled conservatives in his denomination, and prompted close scrutiny of the process of discernment Forrester himself led that produced his name as the sole candidate for the post left vacant by the death of the diocese’s previous bishop, Rev. Jim Kelsey, in June 2007.
Forrester’s election must be ratified within 120 days by a majority of bishops and diocesan standing committees in the Episcopal Church before he can officially assume his new role. Defenders of orthodoxy—both Episcopal and at large—have leaped through that window of opportunity hoping to thwart what they see as yet another effort by progressives to weaken the foundations of Christian faith.

“The bottom line is that Forrester has embraced something foreign and contradictory,” wrote Greg Griffith, a blogger at the conservative Anglican Web site Stand Firm in Faith. “Call it a faith, call it a philosophy, call it what you will but it is not Christianity. One simply cannot embrace the doctrines of Buddhism—Zen or any other flavor—and simultaneously embrace the doctrines of Christianity.”

“The reality is that this particular meditative practice is not in step with Christian doctrine,” concurred James Tonkowich, president of the Institute on Religion and Democracy, a think tank with ties to the neo-conservative movement and a history of exploiting wedge issues in order to widen rifts in mainline Protestant denominations. “The issue is not whether meditation is good,” Tonkowich said, “it is what is being meditated on.”

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http://www.religiondispatches.org/archive/religionandtheology/1255/karma_chameleon:_from_zen_practitioner_to_episcopal_bishop