The evening will be in the main shrine room, as we are sharing the centre with The Poets’ Way. We will have a simple evening of meditation and poetry by Ryokan focussing on the 4 seasons led by Sinhacandra and Jinavamsa. Please note there is no soup to start this silent evening.
6:30 - 8:30.
Listen and download: http://www.freebuddhistaudio.com/audio/details?num=LOC2712
Sthanashraddha is Bhante’s secretary. With our apologies for the delay, here is his March diary for Bhante.
“Spring is forcing its way up through the ground here at Adhisthana, in the way that green things do, slowly, quietly and without halt. Then suddenly we take notice and the eye is caught by daffodils and tulips flowering. Though much of March has been dry and even sunny, the last couple of days have seen a cold shift and some nights of heavy rain. Due to the mostly good spring weather Bhante has been out for his morning walk by the pond most days, enjoying the light, sunny weather and fresh air.
Of course even the ‘poor’ weather has not left Bhante without diversion, having a good selection of ‘talking books’ and visitors over this last month. Recently the College of Public Preceptors were here for 10 days and Bhante met quite a few of them.
As well as the novels Bhante has listened to, Suvajra has also been reading to him in the evenings from Berdyaev’s The Destiny of Man, Nietzsche’s Beyond Good and Evil and Kierkegaard’s Either/Or - books which he read many years ago but has been happy to revisit. Near the beginning of the month Bhante received a beautifully printed copy of his Threefold Puja bound in golden patterned card, which had been translated by Pabodhana’s Burmese teacher training students. Since translating the puja into their own language they have been reciting it after their lessons each day. He was pleased to receive this and hear of its use.
Also during the last month Bhante made a visit to the hospital to meet with his consultant eye specialist, as well as a trip to see his dentist for a check up, both of which went well, without any hitches. Bhante’s health continues to be very good for a man of his age, and his sleep remains reasonably good with only the occasional bad night.
We have also seen a fair bit of coming and going this month. Buddhadasa, who had been away for two months, arrived back a few days ago; and Ashvajit, who had covered much of that time, left for his little house in Wales; while, after almost 8 months’ absence, Paramartha, who had been caring for his dying mother, returned yesterday. Bhante is, of course, pleased to see both return.”
The 14 April 2016 is the 125th anniversary of the birth of Dr. B.R. Ambedkar, commemorated as a public holiday in India, and by festivals in the Buddhist community there. We’re choosing to celebrate the anniversary of his birth by giving away four paperback copies of The Buddha on Wall Street, in a Goodreads Giveaway.
The link may not be obvious. Please read on …
In The Buddha on Wall Street, Vaḍḍhaka Linn draws on four Buddhist voices he finds inspiring, and who informed his thoughts about the socio-economic world. He chose Dr. Ambedkar as a leader who worked towards an ideal society based on Buddhist values. Read more in Chapter 11, ‘Buddhist voices’, which we’ve posted here for free.
The Triratna Buddhist Community holds Dr. Ambedkar in high esteem. In 1956, he led a mass conversion of oppressed Dalits to Buddhism and freedom, from a caste-based society that held them at the bottom of its hierarchy. You can learn more about this impressive figure in a full-length film.
Happy birthday to a man who transformed his society and inspired many.
Our programme from June to November 2016 is as follows;
7th June – 12th July - Beginners Meditation Course
Interested in learning to meditate? This six week course will give you focused teaching for the two main meditation practices taught by the Triratna Buddhist Community – the Mindfulness of Breathing and the Meditation on Loving Kindness. Suitable for Beginners.
Cost - £42/£30 (concessions)
13th September – 18th October - Beginners Meditation Course
Interested in learning to meditate? Our popular six week course will give you focused teaching for the two main meditation practices taught by the Triratna Buddhist Community – the Mindfulness of Breathing and the Meditation on Loving Kindness.
Suitable for Beginners.
Cost - £42/£30 (concessions)
25th October – 15th November – Buddhism for Beginners
The Buddha and his teachings: This four week course will cover some of the Buddha’s most practical teachings and help us to understand better our thoughts and emotions. There will be opportunity for discussion and questions. The course is open to anyone with an interest in Buddhism and is suitable for beginners.
Suitable for Beginners. Cost - £28/20 (concessions)
To book or for further information, please contact Vajragupta at
mermaid [at] 251harmony.eclipse.co.uk
Listen and download: http://www.freebuddhistaudio.com/audio/details?num=LOC2713
I’m reading a book that I picked up at Bodhi Books and Gifts in Newtown (if you haven’t been there do yourself a favour and go for a browse) titled ‘Right Here With You’ and It’s a collection of short essays on relationships written by many different Buddhist practitioners and teachers.
The one I’m currently reading is called ‘Making Friends with ourselves’. and the author Moh Hardin encourages us to spend time with ourselves each day in order to make a true friend of ourself.
“Of course we are with ourselves all of the time in some way, but usually we are busy doing something or we are distracted or we want to be entertained. We know what we like and don’t like, but do we really know ourselves? Are we friends with ourselves?”
A retreat is a fab way to get to know oneself; either a solitary or collective retreat.
As Moh goes on to say
” ….. taking some time each day with yourself is the kindest thing you could ever do for yourself. It will also bring benefit to your family, friends, and everyone you love.”
A retreat is a concentrated experience of yourself in (hopefully) very supportive conditions.
We grow and unfold in very beautiful ways on retreats and I encourage you to think about joining us this coming Anzac weekend for a gorgeous retreat at Vijayaloka, our retreat centre on the banks of the Georges River just 45 minutes from Coogee.
If you’ve learnt our two meditation practices you are ready to join us for a weekend of relaxation, meditation and befriending oneself and others.
You can book by clicking on this link
http://www.sydneybuddhistcentre.org.au/payment_retreat.php?item=Sangha%2…
Meditation this week
Thursday 7 - 8.30 pm
Sunday 8 - 8.50 am
Much metta
Padmadakini and Dharmalata
Practise and communicate Buddhism as part of the centre team at Triratna’s North London Buddhist Centre. The trustees are looking for two full-time members to join an established and effective team at our beautiful, well-located and flourishing centre.
This may be for you if you are interested in exploring work and practice within a Triratna team. One role requires financial skills including bookkeeping/ payroll, the second role includes fundraising/ event organising and/or caretaking/ maintenance. Full training will be provided.
Closing date for applications: Friday 27 May 2016.
For an informal conversation about working at the centre please get in touch with Bodhipaksini (bodhipaksini.nlbc [at] gmail.com)
Please contact Satyapurna (//satyapurna.nlbc [at] gmail.com" rel="nofollow">satyapurna.nlbc [at] gmail.com) for an application pack.
Birmingham Buddhist Centre, UK, has a new Chair. Maitrisara writes:
“At the Birmingham Buddhist Centre, we have been welcoming our new Chair, Singhamati, and saying goodbye and thank you to Samacitta, our Chair for the last eight years. Samacitta is returning to Australia to care for her elderly mother.
The handover took place on on Triratna Day, 10th April, within the context of a sevenfold puja led by Paramartha, our Centre President and attended by nearly one hundred people.
On Friday 8th April, we spent an evening rejoicing in Samacitta, just to make absolutely sure that she knows how loved and appreciated she is. She’s got the message quite clearly now!
Singhamati will join the team in June with her many qualities and capabilities; we are looking forward to what the next phase of the Centre’s life brings.
Singhamati is probably best known in Triratna in Europe for her groundbreaking work with the Young Buddhist project. Before she lived and worked at Taraloka for several years. The appointment process involved the local Order as fully as possible and she comes into the role with the whole-hearted backing of the Order mandala in Birmingham.
Sadhu! Sadhu! Sadhu!”
Listen and download: http://www.freebuddhistaudio.com/audio/details?num=LOC2715
To celebrate the 125 Jayanti (birthday) of Dr B. R. Ambedkar and the incredible achievements of his life, the Sydney Buddhist Centre’s Young Triratna group and a number of committed members of the Sydney Order (many of whom were recently ordained in India) hosted a special evening of reflection and celebration of this remarkable man.
This short video gives some of the many highlights of an evening rejoicing in the man who, among his many achievements, helped re-establishe Buddhism in the country of its birth.
A Culture of Giving led by Dassini: Relaunching the “let’s drop class charges and give the Dharma away” action plan. Please come along and give your support to making this beautiful idea happen in the world. The centre council and other enthusiasts welcome you to take part in discussion and planning.
The evening will start with soup which will be provided, but please bring some vegetarian food to accompany and share.
5:30pm - 9:00pm.
Drawing upon the myths in the life of the Buddha Satyapara explores the role the body plays when we take up Buddhist practice. She describes the Buddha as a child under a rose apple tree being deeply in touch with his surrounding and when calling upon the earth he gains confidence in his practice and overcomes his doubts. With this stories Satyapara invites us to trust our body. Given in Cambridge in the Young Peoples Evening.
In this workshop, Dh Satyada will provide an introduction to the Anapanasati Sutta, the Buddha’s core teaching on mindfulness of breathing practice. The verses in this sutta lead the practitioner through observation of the breath into the four fields of mindfulness – body, feelings, mental states (mood), and mind objects. In progressive stages, Anapansati strengthens our ability to focus the mind and gladden the heart as we embrace the reality of impermanence. Offered by donation. Suggeted donation $50-25.
In the Anapanasati Sutta the Buddha advises us that “Mindfulness of in-and-out breathing, when developed and pursued, is of great fruit, of great benefit. Mindfulness of in-and-out breathing, when developed and pursued, brings the four frames of reference to their culmination. The four frames of reference, when developed and pursued, bring the seven factors for awakening to their culmination. The seven factors for awakening, when developed and pursued, bring clear knowing and release to their culmination.” MN 118
The workshop will provide an introduction to this teaching which (when developed and pursued) can bring us all the way to freedom. We will examine what is meant by the four frames of reference and the seven factors of enlightenment. The day will conclude with a full run through of the Buddha’s sixteen meditation instructions contained in the sutta.
“Ensuring the sexual, physical and psychological safety of young people and vulnerable adults involved in the activities of Triratna Buddhist Centres and other enterprises is an expression of the First Precept: the principle of non-harming, or love.”
So opens Triratna’s ‘Child protection general advice’ document for centres and enterprises in Europe, the introduction to a set of model policies developed over the last three years to help Triratna’s European Chairs meet their ethical and legal responsibilities to safeguard children and ‘vulnerable adults’.
In addition I’m running a Safeguarding training day for Order members later this year and I’m happy to say it’s booking up well.
The European Chairs’ Assembly’s (ECA) model safeguarding policiesare available for adoption/adaptation/translation by Triratna centres and enterprises anywhere in the world – or indeed by other institutions, Buddhist or otherwise.
Having spent a considerable amount of time developing them, I’m happy to say they have even been praised by Buddhists beyond Triratna; indeed one of them appears on a child protection website as an example of good practice.
Please use or share them as you wish.
Training day on Safeguarding children and vulnerable adults
Tailored training for Triratna Order members
Monday 7th November 2016, Birmingham
£35 per person including vegan lunch
munisha [at] triratnadevelopment.org (Contact me)to book a place, or for any other related query.
Munisha
Safeguarding officer, children and vulnerable adults
ECA Development Team
Listen and download: http://www.freebuddhistaudio.com/audio/details?num=LOC2717
Listen and download: http://www.freebuddhistaudio.com/audio/details?num=LOC2718
Order Weekend at Saddhamma Pradeep Retreat Center from 7th to 10th Apr 16. Attended by 55 order members among them were 18 Dhammacharini. Dh. Karmavajra, Dh. Chandrashil and Dh. Vimaldhamma given talk.
Listen to this recent BBC radio documentary featuring our very own Maitriveer Nagarjuna! It is about why the Dalits, after generations of oppression, are converting to Buddhism. An interesting listen in that it highlights the problems of caste, which it calls apartheid, as well as the current difficulties the new Buddhists face as they leave the dominant Hindu culture. However, I think it presents conversion to Buddhism as a reaction against Hinduism and underplays the inspiration of following the Buddhist path itself. She says that Dr Ambedkar embraced Buddhism as a political move. This is very far from the truth. He had a deep feeling for the spiritual life and a lifelong interest in Buddhism. As he said himself “Whatever good things I have in me or whatever have been the benefits of my education to society, I owe them to the religious feelings in me”. What is true is that Ambedkar did ‘open the lock on caste’. We have a unique opportunity to help people open a door to a different way of living, to transformation of self and society in the light of the Dhamma. What do you think of the programme?
http://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p03qkq4h
BBC world service, ‘Heart and Soul: Converting out of Caste’ 17/4/16
Before enlightenment, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water
This famous Zen saying captures the magic of spiritual growth and development.
One’s life might look very similar as one understands one’s life and experience more and more fully and as one’s heart opens wider and wider. We may very well still be parents, partners, employees and whatever roles and functions we fulfil but our experience of these roles and the life that we live changes profoundly.
Freedom, contentment, peace and happiness imbues and flows through every aspect of our life in proportion to the progress we make. It’s not necessarily about changing the physical conditions of our life (although this may very well happen) but rather sitting in relation to life from a profoundly different perspective.
So fast track this process …. come and meditate with us (and by yourself)
And perhaps make a smart, last minute decision to come on retreat with the big, beautiful and friendly pack at our sangha retreat at Vijayaloka this weekend.
It’s both chilled and deep at the same time as we explore the Buddha of the West; Amitabha the deep red Buddha of transformation …………..
There will be order members from the Sydney Buddhist Centre and mitras (friends of our order) leading and supporting the retreat along with myself.
Here’s a link to book and feel free to email me with questions ….
http://www.sydneybuddhistcentre.org.au/payment_retreat.php?item=Sangha%2…
Meditation this week
Thursday 7 - 8.30 pm (Jim from Breathworks to lead)
Sunday 8 - 8.50 am (Padmadakini to lead)
And advance notice: Amanda is leaving in a month or so’s time for San Diego and prior to her leaving we’re going to hold a Friendship Ceremony for her at the end of the Thursday night meditation on May 5th. It would be lovely if you can come along to share that with her - I’ll bring a cake to share!
Much metta
Dharmalata and Padmadakini
