“In zazen, leave your front door and your back door open. Let thoughts come and go. Just don’t serve them tea.”
—Shunryu suzuki roshi
“In zazen, leave your front door and your back door open. Let thoughts come and go. Just don’t serve them tea.”
—Shunryu suzuki roshi
Zen Fields is a 501c3 non-profit organization located in central Iowa. Our aim is to provide opportunities for people to practice meditation and to study themselves through the lens of Buddhist teachings.
Pure Land of Iowa began as a small weekly service in one of its teachers homes in 2005. It later moved into a large practice space located at 8364 Hickman Road, in Clive, Iowa. Pure Land of Iowa provides a home for three different traditions of Buddhism.
Nebraska Zen Center
Daishin is presently serving as interim Head Priest of the Nebraska Zen Center, located in Omaha. NZC has an almost 50 year history of offering zen practice in the Midwest, with roots in the Katagiri Roshi lineage.
The Society of Friends or Quakers advocate for being directed by one's "inner light." In this sense Quakerism is compatible with the teachings of Zen which believes that all beings have the light of Buddha within them. Friends Meeting House is located at 121 S. Maple Avenue in Ames, and has been hosting Zen Fields meditation retreats since the beginning of the pandemic.
Our teachers travel between Ames and Clive, Iowa, providing practice opportunities and consultations with students close to their homes.
Soto Zen Priest
Reverend Daishin Eric McCabe is a priest in the Soto Zen school of Buddhism in Japan. Studying Ecology and the World’s Religious traditions at Bucknell University, where he received his B.A. in 1995 prepared him for life as a Zen priest.
His early mentors were Prof. John Grim and Mary Evelyn Tucker with whom he studied Inter-religious Dialogue with a special interest in Indigenous lifeways. He subsequently apprenticed with Patricia Dai-En Bennage Roshi of Mount Equity Zendo for 15 years.
During this time, he trained at several Soto Zen Monasteries in Japan as well as in France with the Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh. In 2013, he continued training in the art of spiritual direction and Chaplaincy at Wellspan Hospital in Pennsylvania. He is recognized as an International Zen Teacher (Kokusaifukyoshi) by the Soto Shu.
In addition to working with Zen Fields, Daishin teaches at the Nebraska Zen Center in Omaha, offers Trauma Sensitive Yoga for mental health at Broadlawns Hospital and Mary Greeley Medical Center, lectures on the World Religions at Des Moines Area Community College, and works as a chaplain at Mary Greeley Medical Center. He resides with his wife, Reverend Sara Jisho Siebert, and their son, Malcolm, and daughter, Pema, in Ames, Iowa.
Soto Zen Priest
Jisho Sara Siebert is a Soto Zen Buddhist priest who was led to Buddhism by the suffering around her and in her work to prevent domestic and sexual violence.
Her path to understand suffering and joy led her to Los Angeles – where she first met her teacher, Gengo Akiba Roshi, then to Papua New Guinea, Liberia, Sierra Leone, Uganda, monasteries in Japan, and Haiti.
At present she works for Beyond Borders, an organization working in Haiti, committed to preventing violence against girls and women and ending child slavery.
She is recognized as an International Zen Teacher (Kokusaifukyoshi) by the Soto Shu and teaches at Zen Fields in Ames, Iowa.
Zen Fields is a 501c3 non-profit organization and a member of the Soto Zen Buddhist Association.
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If you have a concern about a possible ethical breach in our sangha, please report it to our Ethical Designee, Minniette Milligan. Having an Ethical Designee outside our governing Board leadership provides a more neutral party to hear your concern. If you have a concern, we want to hear it and to take appropriate actions to resolve it as soon as possible.
