Adjusted Schedule (please not times marked with asterix have changed):

Events for People of Color  

• Friday, December 14, 6-9pm 
• Sunday, December 16, 3-6pm*

Weekend Workshop –  everyone welcome

• Saturday, December 15, 9:30-12:30 & 2-5:30pm*
• Sunday, December 16, 11:00am-1:30pm*

Called “the most intriguing African-American Buddhist” by Library Journal, Rev. angel Kyodo williams Sensei, is an author, maverick spiritual teacher, master trainer and founder of Center for Transformative Change. She has been bridging the worlds of personal transformation and justice since the publication of her critically-acclaimed book, Being Black: Zen and the Art of Living With Fearlessness and Grace. Being Black was hailed as “an act of love” by Pulitzer Prize winner Alice Walker and “a classic” by Buddhist teacher Jack Kornfield. Her new book, Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love, and Liberation, explores racial injustice as a barrier to collective awakening.

Radical Dharma is an urgent call to dharma communities to wake from the habitual ways they and their members reproduce and sustain exclusion. Radical Dharma advocates a “new dharma” that deconstructs rather than amplifies systems of suffering, and prepares us to weigh the shortcomings not only of our own minds, but also of our communities.

We can only accomplish shifts in awareness through radical honesty, a common ground where we can drop our need for perfection to speak and act from a place of deep vulnerability, and authentic presence. Regardless of how unpleasant this feels or how messy this looks, Radical Dharma emerges out this kind of disarmed honesty, just as a lotus emerges from the mud. The workshop will serve to:

• create a space where participants can practice radical honesty

• create a space where historically marginalized voices in American sanghas are centered

• investigate how “politics of dis-belonging” plays a role in silencing ourselves and others

• equip participants with tools that can be taken back to their practices communities to continue the work creating radically inclusive and honest communities

This event aims to take the conversation deeper than in previous Seattle visits from Rev. angel. Participants who have not yet spent time with Rev. angel are required to have read Radical Dharma AND attended or read/listened to additional investigations of racism in America. Here are a few we strongly recommend:

• Undoing Racism Training with People’s Institute for Survival and Beyond
• Skill in Action: Radicalizing Your Yoga Practice to Create a Just World by Michelle Johnson
• Robin DiAngelo Training or book White Fragility: Why It’s So Hard For White People to Talk About Racism
• Unpacking Whiteness Series with Anna-Brown Griswold (starts October 24)
• Seeing White Scene on Radio Podcast (14 episodes)

Location: Southside Commons, 3518 South Edmunds Street in Columbia City

Cost:

• Events for People of Color on Friday evening and Sunday afternoon: Dana (donation)-based. Make a heartfelt offering.

• Saturday am & pm and Sunday am: This event will be offered at three rate options to support meaningful access at different economic levels. If you are able to invest in social justice work and support our efforts to make this workshop and others accessible, please consider the SUPPORTING rate. If you need financial support to access this workshop, purchase at the SUPPORTED rate. Otherwise, SUSTAINING is the market value rate that takes into account the teacher’s pay and hosting expenses. No partial registration. Opportunity to offer Dana (heart-felt donation) to Reverend angel will be available on Sunday.

Please note, Sustaining and Supported tickets are currently on wait list, Supporting tickets are still available.

   – Supporting: $295

   – Sustaining: $210

   – Supported: $85

Cancellation Policy: Refunds of 75% up to seven days prior to workshop. No refunds allowable after that time.

Questions about this workshop? Please email mcpssuggestions@gmail.com.

About Rev. Angel Kyodo williams

Ordained as a Zen priest, she is a Sensei, the second black woman recognized as a teacher in her lineage. She is a social visionary that applies wisdom teachings and practice to social issues. She sees Transformative Social Change as America’s next great movement.  She is an early shaper and leading voice in that work and coined the name for the field. In recognition of her work, Rev. angel received the first Creating Enlightened Society Award from Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche, the leader of the international Shambhala Community.

For over 15 years, she has deeply invested her time and energy to putting into practice her unwavering belief that the key to transforming society is transforming our inner lives. She has developed comprehensive systems for illuminating both practical personal change and the profoundly liberating potential of mindfulness, yoga, and somatic practices coupled with wisdom teachings. Calling for a paradigm shift that “changes the way change is done,” angel envisions the building of a presence-centered social justice movement as the foundation for personal freedom, a just society and the healing of divisions of race, class, faith and politic.

Both fierce and grounded, she is known for her unflinching willingness to both sit with and speak uncomfortable truths with love. Her work has been widely covered by such publications as New York Times, Boston Globe, Ms., Essence, Buddhadharma, Village Voice, and on the Oxygen Channel. angel notes, “Love and justice are not two. Without inner change, there can be no outer change. Without collective change, no change matters.” Whether in writing, teaching or speaking, her voice is unique.