honoluluadvertiser.com

Sponsored by:

Comment, blog & share photos

Log in | Become a member
The Honolulu Advertiser
Posted on: Thursday, January 16, 2003

Ex-Buddhist monk shares hard-gained insights

By Mary Kaye Ritz
Advertiser Religion & Ethics Writer

Alan Clements

"Instinct for Freedom: Finding Liberation Through Living." Talk and book-signing

Free

7 p.m. tomorrow

Krauss 12 Yukiyoshi Room, UH-Manoa

Also: noncredit workshop 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Jan. 18, $85. Register: online or 956-8400.

On Maui: free talk, 7 p.m. Jan. 23, Borders.

Clements performs his one-man show, "Spiritually Incorrect," at 7:30 p.m. Jan. 24 , McCoy Studio Theatre, Maui Arts & Cultural Center. $18; (808) 242-7469.

It's a bit hard to get concrete with Alan Clements, the first North American to become a Buddhist monk in Burma.

The philosopher and performance artist tends to go ethereal in conversations while you're still adjusting your headset.

"Alan's life is material for a legend," writes Catherine Ingram, author of "In the Footsteps of Gandhi." "An intellectual artist, freedom fighter, former Buddhist monk, he shares his insights and experience with a passion rarely seen and even more rarely lived. He'll make you think and feel in ways that challenge your entire way of being."

Maybe, but let me get settled first.

After spending 15 summers in a row on Maui, the ex-monk now lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, when he's not performing his one-man show, "Spiritually Incorrect," an unscripted, unrehearsed show Clements describes as "dealing exclusively with a celebration of freedom." Which is what he's doing when he is reached in Calgary via telephone. He's ready from "hello" to talk about human rights, about falling into complicity with the war buildup, about ... well, back up. First of all, he's not a Buddhist anymore.

"After having spent many years as a Buddhist monk in Burma, I became less interested in essence of those teachings," he said. He began exploring a different kind of spirituality since then, he said, because "What I didn't learn was how my life interrelated to environment, sexuality, other people, politics — with the globe, if you will."

Clements left his life as a monk, but returned to Burma years later, after the country's 1988 revolution. In 1995, he recorded conversations with Nobel Peace Prize winner Aung San Suu Kyi, the national oppositional leader then under house arrest in Rangoon. The conversations became a book, "Voice of Hope."

These days, the spiritual journey has led him to put his faith into action. He's come to believe that spirituality and politics are essentially inseparable.

A social worker once told him how she went into a camp to work with aboriginal women and presumptuously asked, "What can I do to help you?"

"Well if you're here to help me, please leave," one woman said. "If you're here and see that my freedom and your freedom are linked, please stay and we'll help each other."

The trip to Maui is a homecoming: he's considered the Islands his second home since 1971. "I have a tremendous love for (Hawai'i)," he said.