c. 2007 Religion News Service

BIRMINGHAM, Ala. _ On a Sunday afternoon at the Birmingham Shambhala Meditation Center in Avondale, children sitting on red cushions took turns talking about Buddha and discussed learning how to meditate.

“I’m kind of crazy these days,” said Ashlin Duncan, 6, “and my mom says I should come here.”

“I came here so I can be relaxed,” said Karen Hunt, 7.

Added Jospheine Cleverdon, 7, “I want to be calm, to help other people be calm.”

Several said they knew a little about Buddha.

“He sits still and meditates and he’s all calm,” Josephine said.

“Buddha means enlightened one,” said Ian English, 9, “and to be enlightened you have to be aware of yourself.”

“My grandmother teaches meditation,” said Ben Walton, 7. “I don’t know that much about Buddhism.”

But they were all ready to give it a try, as part of the Shambhala Center’s first effort to teach children about Buddhism and meditation, with classes for those ages 3 to 6 and 7 to 11.

“Sit down, cross your legs, take a breath, hum it out, open your hands,” said Phyllis Mark, the teacher.

The children assumed the lotus position, took a deep breath, exhaled and hummed.

They listened to a children’s story version of the life of Buddha. Then the instructor brought out an empty metal pot and a rubber-coated wooden mallet to tap it with. “This is a gong,” Mark said. She tapped it to make a long, echoing sound.

She urged the children to listen and hold a hand in the air until the sound dissipated. “You’re keeping your mind focused on the gentle sound of the gong,” she said. “Doesn’t that help us relax?”

They tried some yoga positions, such as the tree _ hands up like branches, standing on one leg like a tree trunk.

Later, the children went outside and walked around with their eyes closed until a guide stopped them and held their faces close to a plant, a crack in the concrete or some other detail in the world around them. Then they opened their eyes and looked closely.

“We don’t get a chance when we’re really busy to see things clearly,” Mark said.

The children drew pictures on paper of people whom they were concerned about.

When they ate their snacks, Mark told them to choose one item _ an orange or banana slice or a cookie _ and chew it slowly, focusing on the flavor and texture.

“In Buddhism, there is a belief that if food is prepared with loving kindness,” Mark said, “it nourishes more than your body, it nourishes your soul, too.”

All these exercises, Mark said, helped underline principles of Buddhism.

Buddhism is based on the teachings, or Dharma, of the Indian philosopher Siddhartha Gautama, who lived about 483 B.C. and is known as the Buddha.

“Buddhism is not a theistic philosophy,” Mark said. “Buddha was not a god.”

The Buddha’s essential teaching is that suffering persists from life to life and one can only escape into nirvana by achieving perfection through mental and moral self-purification.

As interest in Buddhism has grown, seekers have journeyed to the Shambhala Center, which was started in 1997 and since 2002 has occupied a small storefront in an office building. The center has a mailing list of about 200.

“It’s a growing group,” Mark said. “There’s a lot of interest in Buddhist philosophy.”

People interested in Buddhism also find answers from Lama Tenzin Deshek, a Tibetan Buddhist monk who moved to Birmingham four years ago to serve as spiritual leader of a 50-member congregation at the Losel Maitri Tibetan Buddhist Center.

The Shambhala stream of Buddhism, brought to the west by Tibetan monk Chogyam Trungpa Rinpoche (who lived from 1939 to 1987), is especially friendly to American culture, focusing on the practice of meditation, Mark said.

“The emphasis in Shambhala is meditation on the cushion,” she said.

“Meditation is part of so many faith traditions,” said Kathy English, a regular at the meditation center. She said the children’s program developed because they sensed a need to instill calm and focus in youngsters.

“We are inventing this as we go, talking about ways of using Buddhism in parenting,” she said.

“We can help kids be a little more thoughtful, slower to act impulsively,” Mark said.

People from various Christian traditions often take part and have brought their children to the program as an educational experience, said Mary Whetsell, who co-founded the Shambhala Center in 1997 with her husband, Chuck Whetsell, and Janet Bronstein, director.

Whetsell said the center is more about sharing knowledge and techniques rather than spreading a faith.

“I call us the nonproselytizers,” Whetsell said.

(Greg Garrison writes for The Birmingham News in Birmingham, Ala.)

KRE/LF END GARRISON

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