Still Center Zen Order – Europe (SCZO-Eu), Zen community without walls in the Lineage of Soyu Matsuoka Roshi

A training center for Soto Zen Priests in Europe teaching « Everyday Zen for Everyone. »

Our Four Pillars of Zen Practice are « Great Doubt, Great Faith,Great Determination, and Great Wonder. »

What we practice
We practice a blend of traditional Zen meditation (Zazen), with dharma talks (teishos), and one-on-one interviews (Dokusan). All are welcome: whether you are interested in taking a deeper dive into Zen, taking the precepts and being given a dharma name or even training to become a Soto Zen Priest, or whether you are just interesed in sitting in and getting to know more about Zen and the benefits of Zen practice.

We are a training center for Soto Zen Priests in Europe.

We particularly welcome new members who share our community-spirit of blending helping ourselves with helping others.


All welcome regardless of experience
All are welcome, beginners through to seasoned Zen practitioners. We’re a Soto Zen Order in the Soto Zen lineage of Soyu Matsuoka, Roshi as an engaged Zen Order of Priests in succession to the Clear Mind Zen Order (founded by Daiho Hilbert, Roshi). Thus we are primarily a Soto Order of Zen Teachers (Sensei).

The Still Center Zen Order is also a center for training Zen Teachers in koan introspection in the Zen lineage of the White Plum Asanga founded by Maezumi Roshi, through Al Rapaport’s Open Mind Zen, in which our founding teacher Ryuko Langdell Roshi received Inka Shomei (full transmission). For more information on koans in our Order, see our « Koans at SCZO-Eu » page.

We’re different: a new kind of Soto Zen. Rooted in Eastern tradition but atuned to Western Culture
While we draw on the Japanese Soto tradition, and its predecessor practice of Chinese Chan, we have formulated a Zen practice and training programs specifically for a Western audience. Thus, while our priests are as rigorously trained as any Soto priests in more traditional Japanese settings, here we recognize that priests in the West are fully in the world not living apart from the world in monasteries.

So, our priests are not required to shave their heads or adopt a lifestyle that is out of keeping with their everyday life and careers, work, etc. Similarly with our training of Zen Teachers who gain expertise in koan introspection and of giving dharma talks, once again our training programs fit your way of life, working with your routines by using technology like Zoom, rather than insisting on residential settings for training.

The same with our teachings and practices: you may find we are both more flexible and yet more intensive – not afraid to go deeper — than some other Zen groups.

At the core, Zen practice is simply about becoming aware of who you truly are. The awakening to your true self, your true nature. And in this awareness, the discovery and full acceptance of both the relative (dualistic) and the absolute (non-dualistic) nature of everything. But whereas other Zen lineages may talk in terms of appreciation of « sunyata » or « emptiness » as a goal of sitting Zazen (seated meditation), here you will find we speak of awakening to your true self as being accompanied by a profound awareness that you are anything but « empty » — your true self is compassion, is presence, is a deep powerful and resonant awareness of the bodhisattva ideal of helping others. That who you truly are is in a real sense « how may I help you. » Yes, in following this Zen practice you may become more compassionate, or become more able to be a non-judgmental presence when with others, but in finding who you truly are you awaken to the simple fact your very nature is infinite compassion, your very nature is a universal presence. And that underpinning this awakening is a deep wisdom that in Zen we call « prajna » or to be more precise you are in your very essence « prajnaparamita » (the perfection of wisdom). Not something you ‘gain,’ not something you ‘attain,’ but simply your very nature. This way, then, is one of compassion, of finding out who you truly are, getting to know yourself and to know others so that you may better help others. It is a way of compassionate warmth, vitality and joy, not a way of clinical, unengaged, dispassionate quietude. 

Wish to know more? Please reach out to find out more about our weekly meetings and the availability of our one-on-one sessions with our teachers (see below).

Dokusan/Mentoring
One on one sessions are also available with Roshi Ryuko and other Zen Teachers, both online in Zoom and in person. These sessions primarily involve koan work for most students, but will also include mentoring through discussion of each student’s particular path. The online dokusan sessions may either happen in a breakout room during our weekly Zazen time together, or at pre-arranged other times throughout the week, either in-person or on Zoom. We have students from all over the world, and invite interest from potential students wherever you are worldwide.

Why is SCZO-E not associated with the Japanese SotoShu?

SCZO-E is not associated with SotoShu in Japan: it was the specific intention of Matsuoka Roshi in forming his version of Zen in the 1960s that it be a Zen custom tailored for Western practicioners independent of the Japanese Soto organization.

First and foremost, because our lineage founder Soyu Matsuoka Roshi established his version of Zen as a truly Western Zen, and he chose not to have any of his priests registered with SotoShu in Japan for this reason. We are following his tradition.

But secondly, we do not require our priests to shave their heads which immediately makes our priests ineligible to be registered with SotoShu. This is something we hold strongly, that here in the West it should not be required that Soto Priests have their head shaved since our system here in the West is largely not a monastic one, but one in which our priests live and work in the world just like anyone else, not desiring to stand out from others by their appearance. This is also also why our priests do not wear their priest vestments in everyday life, they wear their Zen clothing at the Zen Center or when performing a liturgy or, say, a marriage ceremony.

We are only affiliated to our Mother Order, the Still Center Zen Order (SCZO), based in MuShin Ji, Pasadena, California. The SCZO is itself affiliated with the Order of Clear Mind Zen (OCMZ) founded by Daiho Hilbert Roshi.