Membership List

The mysteries of the inner life spoke to me from my earliest years. Seeking clarity I studied Theology at Bristol University 1978 - 81 and there encountered Zen. In 1981 a mentor taught me to meditate in the Burmese Forest Tradition. Imbued with Christian spirituality, drawn by the East, pulled into the peace movement and social action,and years of work with refugees and survivors of political violence, my journey took me deeply into contemplative Catholicism.

Occasional meditation practice was utterly transformed when I met Fr Ama Samy, a Jesuit Priest and Roshi, dharma heir of Yamada Koun in India in 1998. Many sesshins followed in Holland, Germany, Belgium and India. I took a year’s sabbatical from work as a psychotherapist to live at Bodhi Zendo in Tamil Nadu with my young family in 2006. A deepening appreciation of Zen co-existed alongside Christianity and transformed my appreciation of the mystery of the incarnation, which resonated with a timeless non-duality.

Back in England I met Fr Patrick Eastman, freshly returned from the USA, and with Fr Ama’s permission joined the newly formed Wild Goose Zen Sangha, part of the White Plum Asanga, which led to Jukai in 2014 and transmission as Sensei in 2015. In the following year God just disappeared, and with it the interior structure of Christian theology, sin, grace, the notion of living in a created world gave way to the ceaselessly unfolding mystery of the Tathagata, and at the centre of it the liberating beat of the Heart Sūtra: “Form is no other than emptiness.”

This profound shift pressed me to deepen my identification with the Buddhist mythos and serendipitously coincided with a friendship with Dave Keizan Scott, Abbot of Stonewater Zen Sangha that blossomed after a joint meeting of Stonewater and the Wild Goose Zen Sangha in 2017. This eventually led to the wonderful invitation to join Stonewater, followed in April 2023 with Tokudo and in June 2024 Denkai, these have filled me with profound joy.