Michael Ellick

And then went to an academic seminary in New York City with the intent of being a professor.

Because I would never have considered back then being a minister.

No interest, you know.

But at some point while I was in graduate school studying to be a professor, I think I just became pretty disillusioned with the whole project of academia and seminary education or Ivy League education.

There's a lot of politics in that and

I felt like I was being intellectually trained, but without a kind of grounding to actually be a better human and better person.

So I started investigating and I'm from a place on, I grew up on Bainbridge Island where I live now.

And Buddhism was always sort of the other appealing alternative.

There was Buddhists around me, Tibetan and Zen.

So I started to really, some point in seminary, really seek out guidance and training in a Buddhist framework.

When I entered, I would say that

My intent was to train with people who would make me a better person, a better follower of Jesus.

I still felt faithful to the Christian story.

I just was sort of anti-Christian religion.

So I trained that way for years and really considered being a full monk and spending my life inside that framework.

But for a variety of reasons, decided that wasn't the way to go.

I went through 9-11.

I was someone who worked in the financial district when the Twin Towers came down.

Saw it all happen, was present for it, watched.

Christianity become jingoistic and rhetoric to defend sort of American aggression.