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SUMMARY:Mindfulness\, heartfulness and compassion: a dialogue with faith leaders
DESCRIPTION:A one-day symposium in Brighton exploring mindfulness\, heartfulness and compassion-based practices with faith leaders. \n\n\n\nWhat is the symposium about?\n\n\n\nDuring the day\, representatives from many of the major faiths will share mindfulness\, heartfulness and compassion practices from their traditions. We will then engage in a dialogue about what unites us and what we can learn from one another.  See the programme below.  \n\n\n\nContemporary mindfulness\, heartfulness and compassion-based practices derive predominantly from established spiritual pathways or religious traditions. However\, in the secularised workplaces in which they are often delivered\, the religion has been necessarily stripped away from the practices.  \n\n\n\nWhile this makes them more accessible to people who are not part of any religion\, the danger is that by taking them out of their contexts and communities these practices may become technical\, individualised and self-serving\, losing their deeper meaning and their more profound capacity for change and connection.   \n\n\n\nWe need to be careful that our secularised inclusiveness does not exclude the diversity offered by religious and spiritual traditions and the people affiliated to them\, on whose shoulders these contemporary practices rest. Increasingly\, we recognise that passing off something that belongs to the wisdom of often non-Western\, non-white cultures as a new\, scientific discovery can be unacceptable cultural appropriation.  \n\n\n\nBy restricting conversations about these depth foundations\, we miss an opportunity to find rich connections and understandings across many different faiths that have meditation and the cultivation of qualities such as presence\, kindness and compassion at the heart of what they do. At a time in the world where religion can be the cause of division and tribalism\, this opportunity to connect and build understanding in this domain seems more important than ever. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nWho is this for?\n\n\n\nAnyone interested in the roots of mindfulness. Everyone is welcome\, from any faith or none. \n\n\n\nThe format of the day\n\n\n\n9.00 Registration \n\n\n\n9.30 Introduction and framing of the day: Robert Marx\, Co-Lead of Sussex Mindfulness Centre  \n\n\n\nPractices: The practices follow a simple format including a five minute introduction followed by 15 minutes of practice. \n\n\n\n9.45 Christian Catholic: Liz Lord \n\n\n\n10.05 Tibetan Buddhist: Paul Johanson \n\n\n\n10.25 Sufi: Binah Taylor \n\n\n\n10.45 Tea \n\n\n\n11.15 Heartfulness/Raja yoga: Rosalind Pearmain \n\n\n\n11.35 Pagan: Lyn Baylis \n\n\n\n12.05 Jewish/Ha Makom: Miri Cohen \n\n\n\n12.25 Quaker: Jason Evans \n\n\n\n12.45 Responses Robert Marx \n\n\n\n1.00 Lunch : Bring your own and we’ll sit together \n\n\n\n\n2.00 Panel/Round table: A panel discussion two questions: What was striking from other people’s talks and practices? What are you curious about? \n\n\n\n\n\nRev Anthea Ballam\, Chair Interfaith Contact Group\, priest\n\n\n\nProf Justin Meggitt\, Dept of Theology\, University of Cambridge\n\n\n\nDr Chris McDermott\, former Sussex University Chaplain\, Anglican priest and Zen practitioner\n\n\n\nRabbi Danny Newman\, Executive Director of HaMakom\, Rabbi of two Progressive Jewish communities in London and a life coach\n\n\n\nSensei Dheeresh Turnbull\, Zen monk\, author and Cognitive Behaviour Therapist\n\n\n\nDr Rosalind Pearmain\, Heartfulness trainer\, Retired psychotherapy lecturer\, trainer and researcher\n\n\n\nLyn Baylis\, Chair\, The Pagan Seminary and Pagan Spiritual Advisor\n\n\n\nIbrahim Karadol\,  Dialogue Society branch manager\n\n\n\n\n2.45 Drawing out key themes for further (small group) discussion \n\n\n\n3.00 Tea \n\n\n\n3.30 Theme-based discussion \n\n\n\n4.30 Gather learning\, appreciations\, and considering what next facilitated by Robert Marx \n\n\n\n4.50 Practice led by Robert Marx  \n\n\n\n5.00  End \n\n\n\nThe hosts\n\n\n\nThe Sussex Mindfulness Centre is hosting the day with the Interfaith Contact Group of Brighton and Hove. \n\n\n\nThe Interfaith Contact Group of Brighton and Hove creates opportunities and safe spaces for people of different faiths and none to meet and talk. Most of their members and friends belong to faith groups but many don’t. \n\n\n\nThe Sussex Mindfulness Centre aims to improve the wellbeing and mental health of all people who can benefit from mindfulness. We do this by running mindfulness and compassion programmes\, training teachers\, and conducting research. \n\n\n\n\n\nThe facilitators\n\n\n\nRev Anthea Ballam\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRev Anthea Ballam is an interfaith minister\, writer and celebrant. She has served as Chaplain to the Mayor of Brighton and Hove on two occasions and is currently the Chair of The Interfaith Contact Group of Brighton and Hove. Anthea is the author of two books of prayer: “Moving Prayers and Quiet Meditations” and “Words for Funerals”; also a history book “Mayflower: The Voyage the Changed the World.” \n\n\n\nBefore becoming an interfaith minister\, Anthea was a journalist and ran her own marketing company. Her interests include photography\, art and music. \n\n\n\nLyn Baylis\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nLyn Baylis is a mother\, grandmother and a great grandmother. She has been a Pagan Priestess for over 50 years\, holding senior roles in several organisations and is now Pagan Spiritual Advisor for Sussex NHS Community Foundation Trust\, as well as being a Founding member and Chair of The Pagan Seminary. Having worked as a Prison Chaplain for over 10 years before becoming a Hospital and Hospice Chaplain\, she is determined that\, all spiritualities should have a platform and as the popularity of nature-based beliefs increase\, there should be sufficiently skilled Pagan Chaplains to tend to the spiritual and practical needs of this growing community. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nMiri B Cohen\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nMiri has been practising meditation for over 25 years\, mainly in the Insight tradition. She is an NHS-trained Mindfulness Based Cognitive Therapy/Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction teacher and a graduate of Yesod\, the Jewish meditation programme from Or HaLev and the Institute for Jewish Spirituality. Miri facilitates meditation groups in person and online for HaMakom and secular organisations and gives one to one sessions. She is a member of the Community Dharma Leader system at Gaia House\, Devon\, UK. Miri is a student of the late Rob Burbea and his teaching influences her approach.  \n\n\n\nJason Evans\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nJason Evans is a member of Sussex West Area Quaker Meeting and worships at Brighton. He joined the Religious Society of Friends (Quakers) in 2002 and has served as Elder\, Overseer (now called Pastoral Friends) and as a member of the Clerking team. He has been the Quaker Chaplain at the University of Sussex since 2015. He is interested in lucid dreaming and plays jazz harmonica. \n\n\n\n \n\n\n\nPaul Johanson\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nBrought up as a Roman Catholic\, Paul began training in the Rinzai Zen Buddhist tradition in 1988 at the Hannya temple in London. The temple was run by the London Zen Society and affiliated to Ryutaku-Ji\, a monastery in Mishima\, Japan founded by Hakuin-Zenji\, one of the great masters of Rinzai Zen. In 1991\, Paul began sitting with a small\, local group called Maitrikara (a Sanskrit word\, meaning ‘source of loving kindness’)\, which is affiliated to the “Centre d’Etudes de Chanteloube” situated in the Dordogne region of France. Chanteloube was founded with the inspiration and guidance of three great masters of Tibetan Buddhism: Kyabje Dudjom Rinpoche; Kyabje Dilgo Khyentse Rinpoche; and Kyabje Kangyur Rinpoche. Paul considers Jigme Khyentse Rinpoche to be his main teacher and has been practising under his guidance since I first met him in 1992. \n\n\n\nPaul still feels a strong connection to his Christian roots and to his early Zen training. He has worked in health and social care since 1991\, mainly in the field of mental health. He currently works as a psychotherapist in private practice. \n\n\n\nLiz Lord\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nLiz practiced awareness\, appreciation and compassion since childhood\, as part of a Christian upbringing and in my mid 20’s completed my first 8-day silent guided retreat with the Jesuits. She has regularly attended long silent retreats from different traditions at Gaia House\, Dzochen Beara and St Beuno’s as well as themed retreats in a number of different places\, both in the UK and abroad. She has undertaken long-distanced walking retreats throughout her adult life\, often following ancient pilgrimage routes. \n\n\n\nShe was introduced to mindfulness while working with teenagers in a Pupil Referral Unit in Salford in 2007.  Liz is currently a tutor on the MSt in Mindfulness at the University of Oxford. Since 2015 she has been a senior researcher in the Dept of Psychiatry\, working on the MYRIAD project which has been investigating all aspects of mindfulness in education.  She works freelance as part of the teaching\, training and mentoring team at the Oxford Mindfulness Foundation (OMF).  \n\n\n\nRobert Marx\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRobert is Co-Lead (Training) for the Sussex Mindfulness Centre. He is a consultant clinical psychologist and has been involved in running mindfulness groups for staff and patients since 2006. He also trains and supervises others doing mindfulness work. He is interested in relational mindfulness and in adaptations of Mindfulness-based Interventions using compassion practices. \n\n\n\nChris McDermott\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nDr. Chris McDermott\, an Anglican priest\, Third Order Franciscan\, and Zen practitioner\, spent 27 years as a community mediator in East London before becoming the University Chaplain and Lead Faith Advisor at the University of Sussex in 2014. He is also an ADRg qualified workplace mediator. After retiring as Chaplain\, he completed his Ph.D. research on dual religious belonging\, especially Buddhist Christian belonging. His thesis is entitled\, ‘Gillian Rose and the Question of Dual Religious Belonging: On the Difficulty of Being Buddhist and Christian’. His essay\, ‘Aporetic Belonging: Thinking Buddhist Christian Practice with Gillian Rose’ is published in the 2024 edition of the Buddhist Christian Studies Journal\, published by the University of Hawaii. \n\n\n\n\n\nJustin Meggitt\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nJustin Meggitt is Professor of the Study of Religion\, at Cambridge university and Visiting Researcher\, Department of Ethnology\, History of Religion\, and Gender Studies at Stockholm University.  Justin has been employed in the academic study of religion for over three decades in various universities in the UK\, the US\, and Sweden. Although his interests range widely\, he has always had a particular fascination with the relationships between religions\, conflict and peacemaking\, in all their different expressions\, from the interpersonal to the global. He is especially passionate about understanding how countercultural religious movements perpetuate and challenge violence\, and are also so often the victims of it. \n\n\n\n\n\nRabbi Danny Newman\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRabbi Danny is the Founder and Executive Director of HaMakom. He has been studying and teaching meditation\, Jewish spirituality\, Jewish thought and mysticism for over twenty years and is currently the Rabbi of two Progressive Jewish communities in London. Danny also works as a Life Coach and Facilitator of Men’s Groups and Men’s Retreats. He read Jewish Studies at Oxford University\, studied at several Yeshivot in Israel and trained in psychotherapy. Previously he worked for many years in Corporate Law\, Finance and Venture Capital in the City of London. He is married and has two young sons. \n\n\n\nRosalind Pearmain\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nRosalind Pearmain\, Ph.D.\, M.A.\, Dip.Ed.\, B.A. Hons has been practising and sharing Heartfulness as a trainer for more than forty years. In her professional carrier she has included training in the public sector\, in education and health\, practicing as a UKCP registered psychotherapist. She was a course director for a Master’s level degree in Integrative Psychotherapy training at Regents College\, London. Her book ‘The Heart of Listening: Attentional Qualities in Psychotherapy and Counselling’ (Sage 2001) integrated spiritual\, psychotherapeutic and neuroscientific aspects of the heart). She carried out qualitative studies and published on different aspects of transformation\, and change including meditation. Mainly retired\, she will be finishing teaching qualitative research to psychotherapy trainees shortly and lives in Abingdon. \n\n\n\nBinah Taylor \n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nBinah Taylor\, MA\, MA\, BACP Snr Accredited was initiated into Sufism\, a mystical path to awakening\, in 1975 by Fazal Inayat-Khan\, who founded the Sufi Way. She worked closely with him until his death in 1990\, and through his encouragement\, undertook psychotherapy training both in California\, where she lived at the time\, and in the UK. She has a private practice in psychotherapy and clinical supervision based in Brighton.  The Sufi message of love\, service and openness to the present moment has been a constant source of guidance – she supports the current Pir\, Elias Amidon\, and contributes to the Living Sufism online series as well as the quarterly Sufi Way journal called Fresh Rain. A nomad at heart Binah has lived and worked in four continents\, giving her a deep appreciation of life’s diversity and expressions of beauty\, often found in unexpected places. She divides her time between UK\, Spain and Hong Kong nurturing her family connections. \n\n\n\nDheeresh Turnbull\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nDheeresh Shinkai Turnbull (Sensei) started meditation in 1975\, while on the first year of a Religious Studies degree at Lancaster University.  After trying different kinds\, he settled on Zen in 1982\, and received the Zen precepts from his then teacher\, Genpo Roshi\, in 1988.  He received shukke tokudo (monk ordination) from Genpo in 2010\, and was transmitted as a Zen teacher by his current teacher Jeremy Ryokan Sensei in 2020.  He has been running mindfulness courses since 1999.  He also works as a cognitive behavioural therapist (part-time)\, and is married with children\, grandchildren and a cat (his other teacher).  He has written two books: ‘The CBT-pot’ and ‘The Mindfulness Handbook’\, both of which are under revision\, and is working on a third: ‘Getting to Zen’. \n\n\n\nWhere?\n\n\n\nPlease join us in person at the Friends Meeting House\, Ship street\, Brighton (see below). \n\n\n\n\n\nTicket prices\n\n\n\nTicket prices are to help us cover venue costs. \n\n\n\n\nSupported ticket: £20\n\n\n\nStandard ticket: £30 (please buy this ticket if you can afford it\, to support the Sussex Mindfulness Centre)\n\n\n\n\nWe try to keep prices as low as possible so everyone can come. We are not seeking any profit but we do need to cover (mainly venue) costs.  Please contact us if you would like to come but the price is prohibitive.
URL:https://sussexmindfulnesscentre.nhs.uk/event/mindfulness-heartfulness-and-compassion-multi-faith-day/
LOCATION:Friends Meeting House\, Ship Street\, Brighton\, Sussex\, BN1 1AF\, United Kingdom
CATEGORIES:Communities,Compassion,Masterclass
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