Margaret was a co-founder of Treetop Zen Center along with her late husband, Stef. Her gentle, compassionate teaching style lives on in her dharma heir, Peter Seishin Wohl.
Margaret was born in Minneapolis and raised in the Lutheran Church like of the rest of the kids in that city at the time. The church she went to had one of the world’s finest organists and, through him, she learned of the music of J. S. Bach. She fell in love with the music of Bach and with organ music in general. Minneapolis was a great place to grow up, with lots of little lakes — 12 within the city limits — and Minnehaha Falls to visit. She and her friends used to ride their bikes to the falls, park them, and then walk along the stream to the Mississippi River. It was a magical place. She often visited Minnehaha Falls in her dreams.
Margaret went to the University of Michigan, which was a loose family tradition. Her great aunt had been one of the first women to graduate from UM, and her mother and older sister were also graduates. She spent her junior year in Berlin, which was then still a divided city, because she thought she wanted to be a professor of German literature. However, while she was in Berlin, she learned of the discovery of the genetic code by Watson and Crick. She was fascinated. So when she got back to Ann Arbor, Margaret started studying biology. After graduation, she was given a DAAD fellowship to study biology in Germany. This time she went to Munich, where she did more skiing than studying.
In 1967 she went to the University of California at Berkeley to study cell biology. At some point, Margaret realized that a research biologist was not something she wanted to be. She worked in a lab to pay her expenses, studied massage therapy, and got a master of arts degree from the Graduate Theological Union. While at GTU, she learned of the spiritual exercises of St. Ignatius. She attended a number of retreats with the Jesuits there and eventually joined the Roman Catholic Church.
In Berkeley, Margaret also attended a few workshops with Tarthang Tulku Rinpoche and sat with the group at the Nyingma Institute, which formed the roots of her involvement with Buddhism.
Then she moved to Los Angeles, where she met Stef. They were together for a year when he announced he wanted to give it all up and study Zen. Margaret said, “Fine by me,” so off they went to New York to live at Greyston Seminary.
While they were in New York, Margaret decided to become a physician’s assistant, so she went back to school yet again. She worked as a PA in New York City for five years and then in upstate New York for 10 more. Mostly her job involved caring for AIDS patients at a time when the medical community had little or nothing to offer them. She learned a tremendous amount from her patients, mainly about courage in the face of suffering.
Around that same time, Margaret became interested in Zen and began studying with Stef. In 2002, she received dharma transmission. Because she was also doing a lot of teaching in the Catholic Church, she chose not to be ordained as a Buddhist priest. After Margaret stopped teaching in the church, she requested ordination and received denkai (full priest ordination) in 2005.
After the Barragatos both retired from gainful employment, they moved to Holden, Maine. The realtor who sold them their first house here mentioned Bangor Theological Seminary. Less than a week after moving in, Margaret inquired about taking a course in Greek. She wound up completing the courses for a master of divinity degree — covering such useful things as learning how to properly baptize a baby — in order to enter the doctoral program. She received her doctorate in 2007.
Margaret taught at the seminary for a few years, including a course in Buddhist-Christian dialogue, in addition to working with Zen students at Treetop. She often remarked, “From both jobs, I receive more than I give.”
Margaret loved living in Maine. The climate reminded her of Minnesota, and she said it felt like she had come home again with all the lakes and streams and the thick mosquitos. The blackflies were a new experience for her — one she could have happily lived without — but the eagles and the osprey and the muskrats more than made up for them.
One of Margaret’s greatest joys was spending time with her Labrador retriever, Molly, and her two cats, Sadie and Ari. They were sources of much entertainment and much love. All in all, she enjoyed a rich life filled with many blessings.