Our visiting minister, Reverend James Ishmael Ford is a Zen Buddhist priest who has also served as a Unitarian Universalist minister for twenty-five years. Today he will reflect on what Buddhism might bring to our liberal religious concerns for a more just and equitable world.

 

Rev. Ford is the minister-emeritus of the First Unitarian Church of Providence, in Rhode Island. He was recently invited to affiliate as community minister at the Unitarian Universalist Church of Long Beach, where he and his spouse are members. Reverend James is also a Zen Buddhist priest, and the guiding teacher at the Blue Cliff Zen Sangha, which meets at the Long Beach church. He is the author or co-author of several UU pamphlets, for several years an online columnist for the UU World, and is the author of several books, the most recent "If You're Lucky, Your Heart Will Break: Field Notes from a Zen Life."