Hello dear monks. I am currently on the run but I am not sure exactly from what. There was a party last night and to be perfectly honest I drank a little too much alcohol and passed out. I may have done some acts that may not be totally wholesome and I do not remember last night all too well, but I know enough to ask you monks for help and sanctuary. I beg of you not to take some sort of biased opinion of me from the way that I look. Yes I am almost naked, and yes I have a little bit of a hangover still but it is by no means any less than what you yourselves may have experienced in a time before you were monks, in this life or in previous ones.
I have been oppressed my friends, my brothers. And I ask for compassion on your part to take me in. I was raised in America and the ideas of that western culture were being forced upon me from my youth. It led me to desire things that I do not wish to desire and suffer things that I never wish to suffer. It told me that money was the end of all things and that I needed money to buy things and that buying things would make me happy. This did not suit me because I realized that I could never buy everything I wanted, whether it be a bigger house or a nicer car or a boat. I could not stand that society and so I went in search for other things. I have ended up here and in a night of celebrating my freedom from those things that used to bind me down, I am now before you brothers asking you to take me in. Please do not judge me, and condemn me for I am as the pirate in the story from Thich Nhat Hanh. My experiences are different from those of yours and I have been brought up and have lived and am living in a different way to express those many differences in upbringing. I do not apologize for intruding on you or for what I may or may not have done but know that the past is etched into the past and cannot be changed. If I am wrong in what I've done, then Karma shall make sure that I remember and make amends for it. What I have done is what I have done; I am concerned about my future though. What I have yet to do is still what I have yet to do, so may it be something that would be more than if you do not attend to my plea.
You as a part of humanity have a responsibility to me as I am a part of you and you have a part of me. We reflect each other and I know that as a monk you are here to serve me the laity if asked as long as it does not require you to perform outside of your laws. So now I ask to be with you and for some sanctuary. I shall fulfill any roles and duties that are required of me during my stay with you and I appeal for indifference towards me in that I am not here to be judged. I am here for my future and what it may store. In helping me you help yourselves and in condemning me you condemn yourselves.
