Jitsujo T. Gauthier is a Dharma Teacher, Zen Sensei, Priest and Preceptor, empowered and transmitted by Roshi Wendy Egyoku Nakao at the Zen Center of Los Angeles within the White Plum Asanga and Zen Peacemakers lineage. She is a Co-Spiritual Director and one of Five Seat-Holders for the Zen Peacemaker Order, a member of the Buddhist Spiritual Care Educators of North America, and instructor for Buddhist Healthy Boundaries course. She works as an Associate Professor and Chair of Buddhist Chaplaincy at the University of the West, teaching courses like Buddhist Homiletics, Ministry, Spiritual Formation, Contemplative Zen Buddhism, and Engaged Compassion for Master and Doctorate programs. She enjoys taking Buddhist students outside the classroom and temple gates to engage with unhoused, healthcare, and temple communities. She recently cofounded Prism Zen Circle with several others – Prism supports future Zen leaders to facilitate spaces for people to connect and wake up.
In the Fall of 2019 Rev. Jitsujo taught an ‘Engaged Zen Buddhism’ course at Harvard Divinity School as a visiting scholar-practitioner. A similar course called ‘Buddhism in Action’ was taught at Harvard Divinity School by her grandfather teacher Roshi Bernie Glassman in 2011. Teaching this course, learning from the Harvard Divinity School students, volunteering at Haley House and Youth on Fire, participating in a NYC Street Plunge with Joshin Byrnes, visiting Judge Roanne Sragow’s Homeless Court in Cambridge, and visiting Greyston Bakery changed Jitsujo’s way of seeing life, Zen practice, and priest vows.
The Pandemic deepened her commitment to social justice, Zen Peacemaking, and finding tangible ways to bring the Bodhisattva vow to life. Rev. Jitsujo began co-organizing a facing whiteness group, Buddhist chaplain peer circle, neighborhood trash clean-ups, and an inter-Buddhist pilgrimage, as well as engaging in street plunges, bearing witness retreats, anti-racist work, local soup kitchens, and volunteering with Tongva tribe in Los Angeles. She continues to develop curriculums for peacemaking and new ways to energize practice, teaching, and learning with students—methods to care more deeply, have more fun, and truly live this one life. Her practice and pedagogy invite more tenderness, adventure, and breath into meditation, peacemaking, and seeing this world as our classroom.
You can find her dissertation, An On-the-Job Mindfulness Intervention for Pediatric ICU Nurses, published in the Journal of Pediatric Nursing, (2015). Other more published articles include: “Hope In The Midst Of Suffering” in Journal of Pastoral Theology, (2016); “Formation & Supervision in Buddhist Chaplaincy” in Reflective Practice: Formation & Supervision in Ministry, (2017); “Buddhist Chaplaincy in the U.S,” in Oxford Handbook of Buddhist Practice, (2022); “Supervision within Buddhist Chaplaincy Education” in Oxford Handbook of American Buddhism, (2024). Visit and subscribe to her Substack here.
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