Rev. Danny Fisher

This via the great Phil Ryan at the Tricycle Editors’ Blog:  Killing the Buddha‘s Jessica Miller offers some insightful reflections on Mark Oppenheimer’s recent New York Times piece “Sex Scandal Has U.S. Buddhists Looking Within”.  Here’s a good snippet:

It is undeniable that the news is hot on stories of what Oppenheimer calls “clerical impropriety.” As distressed as I am over the sentence I am about to write: it seems as though it is only a matter of time until every religion has its fifteen minutes of sexual scandal. But while stories like this one are trendy, it could be dangerous to analogize one religion’s scandals with those of others.

While this particular instance obviously and unforgivably includes abuse, it is an abuse unique to this particular religious society, and to this particular religious leader. The article makes it seem as though this abbot’s misconduct occurred only among adult women, and we know at least one affair was consensual. The story here is less about adding Buddhism to the list of religions that have had public scandals, and more about how this one community is handling the situation.

Read the rest here.