Buddhism is building distinctly American communities combining the teachings of Zen with the demands of contemporary American life. In clusters
example of community‐building among contemporary Buddhists is the Zen Center on the comfortable east end of Rochester, where
 The Zen Center consists of two large old houses, now joined
. It is his objective to help people make Zen an American way of life rather than a foreign religion
, to “keep the spirit of Zen but give it an American dress. If Zen Buddhism
who shaved his head and considered himself ready to share Zen Buddhist
1966 with a nucleus of people. Today the Zen Center has American affiliates in Denver, Chicago and Boston
one Costa Rica and one in Poland; the Zen Center's estimated membership is 750 worldwide.
 proselytizing is foreign to it. “In Zen, the idea is almost to push people away,
A group of psychiatrists once engaged Roshi Kapleau to explain Zen to them. He obliged by silently munching a ripe
You have just witnessed a first‐rate example of Zen. Are there any questions?” Most of the
awhile and said, “All right. Zen is a flea copulating with an elephant.”
used by Buddhists around the country. At the Zen Center of Los Angeles, a tranquil priest named John
 Daishin BuksbaZen told me how the pain of the politics and the
for something. And many can tell stories like Zenson's, a 30‐year‐old
 priest in the Zen Center.
 Zenson grew up in a small town outside Rochester.
 One day a friend told him about the Zen Center. His first response to meditation was the pain
say what it has done for me,” Zenson says. “Since I came here,
, shaved his head and adopted the name of Zenson ‐ son of Zen. (Roshi
“My parents came to my ordination,” Zenson says. “I once heard one of
 In his recently published book, “Zen: Dawn in the West,” Roshi Kapleau writes
 Deeper Zen meditation comes in four ‐ and seven‐day
background, the interest has most often been in Zen Buddhism, an adaptation of part of a Chinese word
 for meditation, ch'an. Zen is not a worship of a god, and it
shapes. The lesson from the deaths of some Zen masters is that dying is just another step, a
Quakers,” says Dr. Michael TaiZen Soule, a biologist and full‐time official at
 the Los Angeles Zen Center. “Quakers do more good than anyone
 “When one purifies himself,” says Zenson, the priest at the Rochester center, 
basis of prayer. People who are developed in Zen can cast positive forces into the world. They can
the dying, all offered by the Los Angeles Zen ‘Center; college degrees offered by the Nampa
groups have almost nothing to do with groups like the Zen Center of Rochester, which are trying to shed all
people who come to meditate, but some citiZens in New York City, Iowa and Minnesota have
 The Los Angeles Zen Center has a day‐care center for children,
, a commercial artist who is president of the Zen Studies Society in New York City, says his 27
Mr. Busch, who has been practicing Zen Buddhism since 1958, says he never tried to influence
 Of the future of Zen Buddhism in America, Mr. Busch says: 
center in Rochester as an affiliate. “Most Zen teachers move around,” he says of his decision
no concept of an irreplaceable guru. Part of Zen training is not to let people get dependent on you