activities

Rev. Wakoh Shannon Hickey
Duke University

Rev. Wakoh Shannon Hickey is a doctoral student in religion at Duke, and a Soto Zen priest. A former fundamentalist Christian who was ejected from her church for questioning its teachings, she began practicing Buddhism in 1983. Two decades later, she earned MA and M.Div. degrees at a liberal, interdenominational Christian seminary, where she was the only Buddhist student. She also worked as a hospital chaplain, serving cancer and psychiatric patients of all faiths (and none). She was ordained as a Zen priest in 2003, and is now studying American religion and Buddhism at Duke.

Professor Richard Jaffe
Duke University

Professor Richard Jaffe received his Ph.D. in religious studies with a concentration in Buddhist studies from Yale University in 1995. He is a specialist in modern Japanese Buddhism and Chair of the Department. His teaching interests include both Buddhism and Japanese religions. His publications include Neither Monk nor Layman: Clerical Marriage in Modern Japanese Buddhism (Princeton University Press, 2002) and Seeking Shakyamuni: World Travel and the Creation of Modern Japanese Buddhism (forthcoming in Japanese). He currently is working on a book about Japanese Buddhist travel and the transformation of Buddhism in late-nineteenth century Japan.

Jeff Wilson

Jeff Wilson is a doctoral student in religion at the University of North Carolina-Chapel Hill, and a lay teacher of Jodo Shinshu ("True Pure Land") Buddhism. Jeff is also an editor with Tricycle Magazine: The Buddhist Review, and a truly nice guy. Jodo Shinshu is the largest school of Buddhism in Japan, and the oldest (and probably the largest) form present in the United States. In many Mahayana Buddhist countries, Pure Land devotional practices are done alongside meditation. Gratitude is a central feature of Pure Land practice.

John Orr
Durham, NC

John Orr received Theravada Buddhist ordination and training for a period of eight years while living in Thailand and India. He has been teaching meditation and leading retreats around the country since 1980. John currently lives in Durham, North Carolina and teaches at Duke University.

Born in 1938, Sandy Gentei Stewart became interested in Zen when he was sixteen and heard Alan Watts speak on the radio. At age 29 he heard a radio interview with Joshu Sasaki Roshi and immediately knew he had found his teacher. In 1971 he was ordained as a Zen teacher (Osho) and became vice-abbot of the Cimarron Zen Center (now Rinzai-ji in Los Angeles.)

In 1975 he was appointed abbot of the Jemez Bodhi Mandala (now Bodhi Manda) in Jemez Spring, New Mexico. Three years later he moved to North Carolina with his wife Susanna and step-daughter Lara. Sandy has been the guiding force behind the North Carolina Zen Center since its inception.

Owen Flanagan
Duke University

Professor Flanagan joined the Duke faculty in 1993 as Chair of the Department of Philosophy. He also holds appointments in Psychology, Neurobiology, and is Professor in the Graduate Program in Literature. He was previously class of 1919 Professor of Philosophy and Chair of the Philosophy Department at Wellesley College. He was awarded a Fulbright Research Award in 2001-2002 to study Buddhist and Hindu conceptions of the self. Professor Flanagan has written books on the study of consciousness, moral psychology, philosophy of psychology and philosophy of mind.

Professor Barbara Gordon
Elon University

Barbara Gordon is a practitioner at the North Carolina Zen Center where she has been a student of Osho Gentei Stewart for fourteen years. At Elon University she advises Iron Tree Blooming, the campus meditation group, and periodically teaches a course titled "Zen and Writing.”

Taitaku Pat Phelan was ordained in 1977 by the former Abbot of the San Francisco Zen Center, Zentatsu Richard Baker, who was Suzuki Roshi's successor. She has also studied with two of Suzuki Roshi's other disciples, Sojun Mel Weitsman and Tenshin Reb Anderson. In addition, she practiced with Robert Aitken Roshi of the Diamond Sangha in Hawaii. Pat began sitting zazen in Oregon in 1969. She moved to San Francisco in 1971 and spent several years at Tassajara Zen Mountain Center. Prior to her arrival in Chapel Hill in August, 1991, she was a Practice Leader and Director of Zen Center's residence facility in San Francisco.

Geshe Gelek Chodak was born in Gnathang in eastern Sikkim, which is 400 kilometers from Lhasa, the capital of Tibet. At the age of seven he was admitted in Sera Jey Tibetan Mahayana Buddhist University in south India. He graduated in 1998 with the highest of Geshe degrees - Geshe Lharampa, Doctorate of Divinity on Mahayana Buddhist Philosophy of Geluk Tradition of Tibetan Buddhism. Following that, he spent a year of intensive study and practice at Gyud-med Tantric College. In 1998 Geshe Gelek traveled in Europe to teach on death and dying. In June 2000, Lama Zopa Rinpoche invited Geshe Gelek to become resident teacher at Kadampa Center in Raleigh, North Carolina. Geshe-la has learned to speak fluent English in the 4 years he has been at Kadampa Center. He now teaches primarily in English, using humor, examples from everyday American life and stories from Tibetan culture to help students understand the Dharma, its practical applications and its deeper meaning. He constantly emphasizes the importance of practicing as well as studying, of transforming our minds and hearts through applying the teachings to our lives. He has also conducted several lectures and teachings at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill and at Greensboro as well as at Duke University, University of Virginia, and at Menla Mountain Retreat Center in Woodstock NY at the invitation of Robert Thurman.

Holly Rogers
Duke University

Dr. Holly Rogers is a staff psychiatrist at Duke. She is also a Clinical Associate in the Department of Psychology, and is a member of APA, NCPA and the American Academy of Psychiatry and the Law. Dr. Rogers is interested in the biological, psychological, and social causes of emotional suffering. She is particularly interested in the use of mindfulness meditation and mindfulness-based psychotherapy to treat a range of stress-related conditions.

Phra Achan Dhammarato, Bhikku, Ph.D.
Wat Greensboro Meditation Center

Phra Achan Dhammarato has lived in South East Asia and India since 1975 studying and practicing Buddhist meditation for over 28 years with teachers in India, Burma and Thailand. He studied Meditation in India with several teachers including four years with S. N. Goenka. He was ordained by Upajaya Kassa Thero in 1984 near Wat Suan Mokkh in South Thailand and again by Upajaya Candupamo a few years later. There he studied with Ton Achan Bhikkhû Buddhadâsa, teaching and leading retreats for Westerners and visitors at International Meditation retreat center close to Wat Suan Mokkh. Living now in North Carolina, he stays at the various Buddhist Monasteries in Charlotte, High Point and Greensboro. Phra Achan has many students of meditation and teaches dhammâ and vipassana meditation on a regular basis. He has a Masters degree from University of Oklahoma, PhD in Clinical Psychology from Kennedy University and has been combining spiritual practice and Clinical Psychology for 28 years to form a Clinical Buddholigy.

WonGong So
Korea/Chapel Hill

Her Dharma name, WonGong means “a circle” (Won) and “true void” (Gong). She completed her studies consisting of a 1-year apprenticeship, 4 years undergraduate and 1-year graduate and internship courses in Korea and became ordained in 1994 as a Won-Buddhist Priest, addressed as Kyomunim. She served in the Gang-Nam Temple of Won-Buddhism in Seoul for 3 years and moved to the USA in December 1997 when she was assigned to the Rockville Temple in Maryland. After serving in the temple for three years, she received her Master’s degree in Social Work at the University of Maryland in Baltimore. In 2002, she moved to the Triangle area of North Carolina to establish a temple and is currently leading a Won-Buddhism meditation group in Chapel Hill. She also has been working as a Boy Scout and Girl Scout leader in running spiritual youth programs including interfaith ceremonies and activities for World Scout Jamborees in different countries.