Zen schools in America?

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In the unforeseeable future, I wonder if Zen Buddhism in America will not be remembered for its two most notable contributions to the endless flow ... the Lawrence Welk School of Buddhism and the Fox News School.

Lawrence Welk (1903-1992) was an accordionist and bandleader whose "The Lawrence Welk Show" ran on television from 1955 to 1982. The show was aimed at "mature, middle-aged viewers," according to Wikipedia, which also notes that little or no current music ever graced the show. The smooth, nostalgic and lovingly-reproduced sounds were often accompanied by a bubble machine that blew delicate and ephemeral orbs across the stage. Welk himself, with a sparkling smile and impeccable clothes, was sometimes given to commenting, "Wunnerful! Wunnerful!" (Wonderful! Wonderful!) The show was as enfolding and warm as a bucket of spit. Critics might carp, but it is clear from the longevity of the show that Lawrence Welk had tapped into a well-spring of longing ... the compassion of the bodhisattva was actualized right here on your living room screen. No worries, no fears, all troubles laid to rest ... and all those beautiful bubbles. Wunnerful! Wunnerful!

Fox News is a current phenomenon whose impact is every bit as effective as Welk's bubble machine. Critics can whine all they like about the agitprop overlay that the network brings to its 'news' coverage, but its simple and steadfast answers to questions that leave its audience unsure and fearful is just too attractive to be dismissed. Here is a succinct and assured voice within a universe of nuances and possibilities that cry out for reassurance and safety. One swing of Maitreya's bright sword and the locusts of uncertainty are dispersed. Fox News is the assured and disciplined daddy in the willing sect ... a stick in the eye of confusion... a blessed calm on stormy seas. Here is a clear and apparently well-charted course. How attractive people with answers can be. Their unambiguous muscular strictness can be forgiven and forgiven and forgiven again ... as long as they keep providing a sense of certainty in an uncertain universe. Shamelessness is given the throne and lord how the money rolls in.

To the extent that these playful observations hold any water and to the extent that Zen in America may be remembered for its wunnerful and straight-backed rivulets, I don't really relish the idea of jumping up and down in dyspeptic tantrums as if there were some purer, cleaner, less freighted and sometimes frightening options. Everyone picks his poison and, as Charles Williams once observed, "People believe what they want to believe."

But I do wistfully hope that, together with the poisons chosen, there is some determination to see things through, to drink the poison to its dregs and return home smiling.

The bodhisattva of compassion and the bright sword of clarity may be fudged over with the salesmanship of relief, but just because something is a lie doesn't mean it's not the truth... a truth that does not require reliance on others or other wunnerful certainties.
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