Jan Willis examines the subtle—and not so subtle—racism that
exists in American Buddhism. On occasion, people have said to
me, “Oh, I didn’t know that there were African American
Buddhists!” Mostly my reaction is demure, but I sometimes want
to respond with the question, “Why shouldn’t there be?” After
all, African Americans are human beings who think and breathe
and experience suffering just as other human beings do. More
than 2,500 years ago, at the very end of his life, the Buddha
declared, “In all these years, I have taught only two things:
suffering and its cessation.” What a marvelous statement! And,
given the end of the declaration, pretty good news. Who, having
heard and reflected upon such teachings, would not wish to
undertake and practice them? As the Dalai Lama often says today,
“All beings wish to have happiness and to avoid suffering. In
this regard, we are all exactly alike, exactly the same.” It
should come as no surprise, then, that at this historic time in
Buddhist history—when almost all th