Resources
What Are Some Good General Resources?
A Thousand Hands: A Guidebook to Caring for Your Buddhist Community, edited by Nathan Jishin Michon and Daniel Clarkson Fisher (Sumeru Press, 2016). This is an anthology of essays by 50 contributors covering topics from effective listening, financial management, supporting members through grief or health challenges, group facilitation, and family programs.
Many sanghas have found "Council Practice" (sometimes referred to as "Circle Practice") to be a helpful way of building and strengthening community. Here are some web sources of information from the Zen Center of Los Angeles, the Great Plains Zen Center, Zen Peacemakers, Ways of Council and Beyond Us and Them. There are also books which include input from Zen teachers such as The Way of Council by Gigi Coyle and Jack Zimmerman and Virginia Coyle and Where Compassion Begins by Jared Seide.
Practicing Safe Zen: Navigating the Pitfalls on the Road to Liberation, by Julie Seido Nelson (Monkfish Book Publishing, Forthcoming, June 2025). Topics include dissociation, spiritual bypassing, the dangers of thinking one "has arrived," and abuse of power by teachers. It suggests steps that individuals, sanghas, and organizations beyond the sangha can take to increase the safety of the practice. Read the Introduction.
Specific Topics
What Are the Responsibilities of Boards?
Power Structures and Power Struggles: The Role of a Board from the Resilient Sangha Project.
The Little Book of Boards: A Board Member's Handbook for Small (and Very Small) Nonprofits by Erik Hanberg (Side x Side Publishing, 2014).
Running a Nonprofit from the National Council on Nonprofits
How Should We Handle Misconduct in the Sangha?
Responding to Spiritual Leader Misconduct: A Handbook (2022). This pdf document was created by the (sadly, now largely inactive) Faith Trust Institute with contributions from several Zen teachers.
The Resilient Sangha Project These webpages contain essays and resources provided by a group at the Greater Boston Zen Center, a sangha that had to deal with teacher abuses of power.
In an attempt at prevention, Buddhist Healthy Boundaries offers online courses for teachers (and senior students who will become teachers) to help them understand "the complexities of boundaries, power and vulnerability in spiritual teacher-student relationships." Occasional workshops might be offered for other sangha members--inquire at info@buddhisthealthyboundaries.org.
If you would like to suggest additional resources for this page, please contact zenlearnersassoc@gmail.com.