Planting Life 2025 Kinship with the Earth: Bridging Worlds (Part 1)

In this session, Roshi Joan Halifax, Troy Keido Fernandez, Sensei Wendy Johnson, and Alonso Mendez open the annual Planting Life program at Upaya Zen Center. Roshi welcomes in-person and online participants to this sacred gathering that honors ancestral wisdom and earth-based practice. She shares the story of the valley Upaya is nestled in and of the Tewa peoples who have and continue to steward the land in these challenging times. Roshi offers that “this is a ceremony, and it is a ceremony in a way that marks the coming together of worlds” – bridging indigenous traditions with Buddhist practice through the rematriation (a returning) of ancestral seeds to Roxanne Swentzell of Santa Clara Pueblo. Wendy Johnson, joining virtually as a new grandmother, guides participants in earth-touching meditation, reminding us from Keido’s talk yesterday that “seeds change themselves in relationship to where they’re planted” – she adds “so let us change and be changed by the ancestors, by the old voice.” Keido reflects on querencia and herencia – which translate to the places that love us into being and the wisdom passed down through generations, asking what is our ancestral inheritance? Alonso, with touching truth, shares the power of speaking directly to the Earth. He says “put your hands back in the soil, where they belong” and “make the soil tender for the little seeds we plant.” The evening concludes with Roshi and participants singing the meal gata, honoring the land and beings who nourish us. To access the resources page for this program, please sign up by clicking here.