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50 °F Forecast | Road Cams Sunday, April 17, 2005 Today's News | Shop Our Valley | Tempo | Health | Community | Home Delivery | Contact Us SECTIONS Home Page Local News Sports Business Obituaries Life Opinion Tempo AP News Weather Classified Archives Site Map SPECIAL SECTIONS Since We Asked Outdoor Journal Menu Guide How To Guide Health Readers' Choice Real Estate Showcase Real Estate Guide Joy Magazine Homelife Magazine Wedding Guide Passport to the Rogue Valley SHOP OUR VALLEY AutoFinder HomeFinder JobFinder Classified Place an ad TOP JOBS EXTRA Ashland News NIE Personals Movie Times TV Times E The People Volunteer Moving here? eSouthernOregon CUSTOMER SERVICE FAQ's Advertise with us Home Delivery Employment Contact Us Media Kit Oregon Road Conditions & Cams Email Story to a Friend April 16, 2005 The Rev. Etsudo Patty Krahl displays a quilted Jizo banner that commemorates the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The Ashland Zen Center will hold a Jizo-making workshop for the public today. Mail Tribune / Roy Musitelli Giving peace a chance The Ashland Zen Center remembers the WWII bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki with an interfaith display of unity and peace By JOHN DARLING for the Mail Tribune ASHLAND — The Ashland Zen Center is making hundreds of Jizos � images of a protective Japanese saint � to be taken to Hiroshima for the 60th anniversary of the nuclear attacks that killed 270,000 people there. "It’s a rare opportunity for everyone to connect with the people of Hiroshima and to express compassion for the horror and devastation that happened there," said the Rev. Etsudo Patty Krahl of Ashland Zen Center. The center invites people of all faiths to the Jizo-making workshop from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. today at the Ashland Community Center on Winburn Way. Participants will make cloth flags or statuettes of Jizo’s likeness. Those seeking more information may call 535-1418. The "Jizos for Peace" Project started at a Zen monastery in Clatskanie and has spread over the globe, with a goal of 270,000 Jizos — one for each victim of the Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombings. About 200,000 have been made so far. The project is a "gesture of goodwill and reparation from one country to another," said Krahl, "one that shows we can move on after an atrocity and extend each other a warm hand." Advertisement Materials will be provided Saturday for the public to create Jizos, most of which are images drawn or painted on an 8.5-by-11-inch piece of muslin. These may be stitched together to make quilts, such as those on display in downtown shop windows such as One World and Lithia Fountain and Grill. "It’s an endearing process and I believe in the power of intention," said One World owner Dana Ahern. "My intention in making and displaying them is to create a more loving and healing space in the world." The Jizo panels on display usually show many of the smiling, diminutive figures gathered peaceably by rivers, under rainbows, on clouds � along with positive slogans about peace. A Jizo by Barbara Mathieson of Ashland reads, "May all beings live in harmony and peace." One by Billie Rose of Medford says, "The world is peace." Another, showing Jizos as butterflies, says, "Peace is precious." "I’m taking my family to make Jizos and, since they are images of a little bald person, that will be a natural for me," joked the bald Rev. Scott Dalgarno of Ashland’s First Presbyterian Church, who has invited his congregation to the project. "They’ve responded real well. It’s that kind of church," said Dalgarno. "It’s a wonderful way to reach out to Japan and, in a time of war, what better way to balance that and do something positive in the face of 100,000 non-combatants killed in the Iraq War?" The Jizos for Peace Project is not political, said the Rev. Jintei Harold Little of Ashland Zen Center. "The sweet, baby-like Jizos are about seeing people as friends, who are similar to us, rather than seeing enemies," Little said. "We in this country want to say in some way that we understand what happened there and it shouldn’t happen to anyone again." Betty Jean Kelsey of Talent got started on her 108 panels (one for each bead on her prayer bead loop) at a Zen Center women’s retreat last fall "as part of my compassion for them and as a way of saying I’m sorry for what happened to so many innocent people." Jizo is much like the Catholic St. Christopher, the patron saint of travelers � except that Jizo also watches over women and children, said Krahl, noting that, because men were away at war during the nuclear attacks, it was mostly women and children who died. The Jizos are being created across the world in schools, churches, prisons and community gatherings like the Zen Center’s, said Krahl. They will be taken to Hiroshima for a ceremony on the anniversary date this August. John Darling is a freelance writer living in Ashland. E-mail him at [email protected] Mail Tribune Home | Local News | Sports | Business | Obituaries | Life | Opinion AP News | Archives | Site Map | Community | Classified Copyright © 1997-2005 Mail Tribune, Inc. All rights reserved. Privacy Policy | Terms & Conditions | Website Feedback Free Music Downloads Conference Calls - $50/Month Home Security Systems Trunks, Footlocker, Trunk, Footlockers home equity loans helzberg Distance Education Diamonds Online Poker Slippers Student Loans tcg student loan consolidation teleconferencing Memory Foam Mattress w2 forms Tatoo Tatoos Advertisement s