2013 Island Buddhist Picnic

It is now just over four weeks until the annual island Buddhist picnic on Sunday 8th of September, starting from 12:00. This year's will be the sixteenth and we are sticking with the changes to the "usual" format (very Buddhist, anicca and all that). With the Ventnor Botanic Gardens now under private management an entrance fee of £5 per person is being charged and we felt that it's a bit expensive for a picnic. Consequently we have decided that from now on the picnic will return to the Duver at St. Helens.

Bring vegetarian food to share and any toys, games etc. to keep everyone entertained.


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Ayya Khema and the Coincidence

At our Sangha meeting this Tuesday evening members were trawling through our library and the subject of books by Ayya Khema came up.

In the World of strange coincidences (they're only strange if we notice them), I was checking the traffic to this site this morning and noticed that a visitor from Japan had Googled "ayya khema united nations address" and had got a hit to a post on this site from 2008. It was entitled "Talks by Ayya Khema" and detailed a website selling audio tapes of her talks. I corrected the post with the news that all of Ayya Khema's recorded talks have now been digitalised and can be downloaded for free from Dharma Seed.

As to her books, we are fortunate to have the following titles in our collection:-

Being Nobody, Going Nowhere, Meditations on the Buddhist Path,
When the Iron Eagle Flies, Buddhism for the West,
Who is myself?, A guide to Buddhist meditation,
Come and See for Yourself, The Buddhist Path to Happiness,
Be an Island, The Buddhist practice of Inner Peace,
Visible here and now,
I Give You My Life, her autobiography

Ayya Khema was born in Berlin in 1923 to Jewish parents. In 1938, she escaped from Germany with two hundred other children and was taken to Glasgow, Scotland. Her parents went to China and, two years later Ayya Khema joined then in Shanghai. With the outbreak of the war, however, the family was put into a Japanese prisoner-of-war camp and it was here her father died. She later married, had a son and a daughter, and now has four grand-children.

Four years after the American liberation of the camp, Ayya Khema was able to emigrate to the United States. Between 1960 and 1964 she travelled with her husband and son throughout Asia, including the Himalayan countries, and it was at this time she learned meditation. Ten years later she began to teach meditation throughout Europe and Australia. Her experiences led her to become a Buddhist nun in Sri Lanka in 1979, when she was given the name of 'Khema' (Ayya means Venerable) meaning safety and security.

She helped to establish Wat Buddha-Dhamma, a forest monastery in the Theravada tradition, near Sydney, Australia, in 1978. In Colombo she set up the International Buddhist Women's Centre as a training centre for Sri Lankan nuns, and the Parappuduwa Nun's Island at Dodanduwa. (now unfortunately closed). She was the spiritual director of Buddha-Haus in Germany, established in 1989 under her auspices. In June 1997 "Metta Vihara", the first Buddhist forest monastery in Germany, was inaugurated by her, and the first ordinations in the German language took place there.

In 1987 she co-ordinated the first international conference of Buddhist nuns in the history of Buddhism, which resulted in the setting-up of Sakyadhita, a worldwide Buddhist women's organisation. H.H. the Dalai Lama was the keynote speaker at the conference. In May 1987, as an invited lecturer, she was the first ever Buddhist nun to address the United Nations in New York on the topic of Buddhism and World Peace. 

She died in November 1997.............................

NEW MOON – Tuesday 6th August 2013

Appreciation

The wise, being fully alive,
rejoice in appreciative awareness, 
and abide delighting in this capacity.

Dhammapada v. 22

How capable are we of truly appreciating that which is in front of us? And further, can we appreciate that which appreciates? We have the capacity to know, but do we know accurately? For the Buddha and the great disciples, awareness was unobstructed. Awareness, in and of itself, was a source of joy. They knew the range of human experiences, yet were never lost in experience. They simply knew, and their actions of body, speech and mind were an expression of this clear seeing. Our discriminating faculties mean we are able to manipulate conditions and create material comfort and safety. Are we able to stop manipulating conditions and appreciate them in their true light?

Ajahn Munindo

Dr Who Reincarnates as Peter Capaldi

So Matt Smith is to regenerate as Peter Capaldi playing the role of Dr Who.

Or....................

Is the Doctor Reincarnating with the persona of Peter Capaldi?

And now this article from the Buddhist Channel............

Can Buddhists Be Time Travellers?

As we shall see, the Buddhist answer to this interesting question is complex and nuanced… When it comes to travel, we tend to think of it physically. However, it is possible to travel mentally as well. We only need to recall the most vivid memory to know what this means. 

Monk Supply Store

On the western outskirts of Bangkok there is a shop called Hang Sangkapan which sells everything a Buddhist acolyte could need.

At the store, the name of which translates as "Monk Supply," aisles are stocked with candles, Buddha statuettes (both seated and standing) as well as altar tables, CDs, books and countless odds and ends for all monks from novice to abbot.

Thailand has 61.5 million Buddhists among its 65.9 million population, nearly all of them practicing in the Theravada tradition. Males are expected to take robes at least once in their lives. With heads shaved, they spend a few weeks seeking offerings and learning the Buddha's teaching, disciplines and meditation.



For most, it is back to jeans and consumerism afterward. But some return and spend much of their lives in monasteries. According to the National Buddhism Office, Thailand had nearly 300,000 monks and more than 60,000 novice monks at the end of 2012.

(There is a strange reference at the begining of the video to "Buddhist Lent season", they are actually refering to Vassa, the the three-month annual rains retreat. For the duration of Vassa, Bhikkhus remain inside monasteries and temple grounds. In some monasteries, monks dedicate the Vassa to intensive meditation. Some Buddhist lay people choose to observe Vassa by adopting more ascetic practices, such as giving up meat, alcohol, or smoking. 

Vassa is followed by Kathina, a festival in which the laity expresses gratitude to monks. Lay Buddhists bring donations to temples, especially new robes for the monks, hence the relevance of the "Monk Supply" store! 

The Vassa tradition pre-dates the time of the historical Buddha. It was a long-standing custom for mendicant ascetics in India not to travel during the rainy season as roads were washed out and they may have unintentionally harmed crops, insects or even themselves during their travels.)

FULL MOON - Asalha Puja - Monday 22nd July 2013

Virtuous Aloneness

But if you cannot find a good companion
of integrity and wisdom,
then, like a king departing a conquered land,
or a lone elephant wandering the forest,
walk alone.

Dhammapada v. 329

Integrity is the foundation of our practice. Without it nothing develops. We might have eloquent speech and perhaps our articles have been published in popular journals, but if integrity is lacking, practice hasn’t begun. Travelling the spiritual path alone is not a sign of failure; it may mean quite the opposite. If those around us are willing to compromise on impeccability, it is better that we are alone.

With Metta,
Bhikkhu Munindo

Tassajara Zen Mountain Centre Escapes Fire

A fire burning on both sides of Tassajara Creek in a remote part of the Los Padres National Forest had consumed about 169 acres late Wednesday, and about 10 p.m. firefighters said its advance appeared to have been stopped.

The fire, which began about 1 p.m., is burning in the vicinity of the Tassajara Zen Mountain Centre, a Buddhist monastery-retreat with popular hot springs and swimming holes in the Ventana Wilderness.

Jamesburg resident Carol Dougherty, who helped answer the Zen centre telephone Wednesday night, said some guests had voluntarily evacuated but there were no orders to do so. Staff were calling people with reservations to advise them not to come Wednesday or Thursday because the Forest Service would not let them in, she said. One couple arriving Wednesday was turned away by fire officials, she said.

Dougherty said that after an air tanker dropped water on the blaze around 3:30 p.m., she saw "a lot less smoke. ... Hopefully they got the worst of it."

When Shunryu Suzuki, the Japanese Buddhist priest who founded the San Francisco Zen Centre, was first shown Tassajara in the Spring of 1966, he knew immediately that this was the place for his small but growing group of Western students to study Zen in a monastic setting. Fund raising efforts began immediately, and by July of the following year, the first Zen monastery outside of Asia was established.

Since then, life has changed very little at Zenshinji (Zen Heart-Mind Temple), as Tassajara is known formally. And now, from late September until early April, 50-60 students rise before dawn and begin a full day of zazen (meditation), study, and work, following a traditional Buddhist monastic schedule which dates back over thirteen hundred years to the early Tang Dynasty in China.

BREAKING NEWS - Terrorist Bomb Attacks at Bodh Gaya

Nine bomb blasts in a coordinated terror attack rocked Buddhist pilgrimage town of Bodh Gaya and its famed Mahabodhi temple complex in south central Bihar early on Sunday, injuring two monks.

Buddhists from all over the world visit the temple, which has the Bodhi tree under which Buddha is said to have attained enlightenment. “The holy Bodhi tree is safe and there is no damage to it,” said Bihar director general of police Abhayanand.

The police said four blasts took place inside the Mahabodhi temple complex and three occurred at the Terega monastery, while one each were triggered near an 80-feet-tall Buddha statue and a vacant tourist bus parked close to the temple complex.

The police said two live bombs were defused in the town and a third in a village nearby. According to intelligence sources, Bodh Gaya has been in the crosshairs of Pakistan-based terrorists who want to avenge the violence against Rohingya Muslims in Buddhist-dominated Myanmar.