The Buddha’s understanding of how things unfold in this world was keen, comprehensive, and most persuasive, and his explication of that understanding throughout the discourses has a coherence and logical consistency that’s unique among the world’s spiritual traditions. But the Buddha was not a philosopher or a psychologist. The term that’s most often used to define his role is “healer” or “physician”. The Buddha’s doctrine is not simply an explanation of how things are but a prescription for a path of practice that will end the suffering that is an inevitable result of how things unfold.

To be a Buddhist is not to “believe in” Buddhist doctrine, but to practice the Buddhadhamma, the Path that the Buddha defined, the end of which is the end of suffering.

Throughout the discourses, the Buddha gave quite detailed instructions regarding that path, and how to follow it. The most comprehensive teaching regarding the meditative practice that he prescribed is the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta. In that discourse, the Fortunate One gave his audience of bhikkhus precise instructions regarding how to establish mindfulness of their situation in such a way that they could end the attachments that trapped them in that situation minute after minute, hour after hour, day after day, birth after birth. Even today, the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta is the foundational text that guides the meditation of practitioners in nearly all Buddhist traditions.

The Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta is a long discourse, and I’ve prepared a prècis of that discourse for discussion on Tuesday.

To help us to understand the Satipaṭṭhāna Sutta and to teach us something about how its message translates into actual meditative practice, we are fortunate to have a guest speaker who has been a meditator in the Buddhist tradition for twenty years. Mary Ellen Landolina is an active member of the Tri-State Dharma Sangha; she has trained as a Community Dharma Leader at Spirit Rock Meditation Center in Marin County, California and has also trained as a meditation teacher with Matthew Flickstein at the Forest Mountain Insight Meditation Center in Virginia. Prior to her Buddhist practice, Mary Ellen had an extensive background in Christian Contemplation. She remains active as a teacher, offering one on one and small group training, leading all-day retreats and occasionally participating as a teacher in longer retreats in such venues as the Insight Meditation Center and the Forest Refuge in Barre, Massachusetts. She is an engaged Buddhist, who, for many years, conducted regular meditation classes for inmates at Lebanon Correctional Institution; she is currently working with hospice patients who are alone, with no families. She is a woman of great wisdom and simplicity, an inspiring presence, and we are fortunate to have her with us on Tuesday.