Gospel Meets Dharma: Exploring Awakening in Buddhism and Christianity
Friends,
Until I discovered Buddhism, meditation and transformative practice, Christianity made virtually no sense to me. 20 years deep into my exploration of consciousness and the wisdom traditions, my love for Christianity has kindled from a spark into a terrestrial blaze.
Some of the deepest, most transformative teachings I’ve encountered have come not from the Romanized version of Christianity that has so dominated Western civilization, but from the gospels of early rogue outfits who followed the Way out into the desert and off into the Orient.
In this new course offered by Lower Lights, we will use the Gospel of Thomas as a foundational resource. The Gospel of Thomas is a powerful, luminous text only recently discovered near Nag Hammadi, Egypt in 1945. Since then, these “hidden sayings” have slowly started to reshape the world’s understanding of Christianity’s original intent.
I hope you’ll join us for this journey into Christian Mysticism, Buddhist Awakening, and ultimately, the free and open Awareness that belongs to no tradition exclusively.
-Thomas McConkie
Topics include:
•Gospel of Thomas: Hidden Sayings from the Desert
•Salvation vs. Spiritual Awakening: What do these two cousins have in common?
•Moshel Moshelim: Jesus as Wisdom Teacher
•Christ Consciousness & Buddha Nature: Becoming Who You’ve Always Been
•Mindfulness: The Buddha’s Master Stroke
•Nondual Awareness: Walking the Path of the Human Being
•Saints and Bodhisattvas: Being Goodness In the World
*Each class session will include concise lecture, group discussion, and a majority of the time dedicated to meditation and transformative practice.
Dates:
8 sessions will run from September 10th - November 5th with a bye week October 1st. We will meet Monday evenings, 7:30-9:00pm