Abhayagiri will celebrate Luang Por Pasanno’s 70th birthday on Saturday, July 27th and this will also be an opportunity to welcome him back after his year away. With his return from this sabbatical, he will be taking on his new role as Guiding Elder at Abhayagiri, leaving the abbot duties to co-abbots Ajahn Karunadhammo and Ajahn Nyaniko. Please arrive for the meal offering by 10:30 am. There will be an opportunity to gather with Luang Por after the meal, and also likely a Dhamma reflection from him at evening puja at 7pm.
Posted June 12, 2019

Around 1:30pm on June 9, 2019 , Ajahn Sek, Ajahn Ñāniko and Tan Tissaro set off on foot, walking north from Abhayagiri for a tudong (traditional wandering pilgrimmage) planned to last roughly three weeks. Such a traditional pilgrimmage provides an opportunity for the monks to face the uncertainty of not knowing what or even if they will eat and not knowing where they will sleep, as well as the opportunity to engage with people who would not normally visit the monastery.
Posted June 9, 2019

After completing five years of monastic training as a monk under the supervision of one’s home monastery, a monk is thereafter referred to as a majjhima “middle”, denoting the period when one has at least five vassa but less than ten. Majjhima monks will often take the opportunity to practice in other environments. In 2014, after his fifth Rains Retreat as a monk, Tan Kovilo asked permission from Luang Por Pasanno to explore life and training in Thailand. On the plane to Thailand, Tan Kovilo aspired to three goals for his time in Thailand: become fluent in the Thai language, take the opportunity to serve as an attendant to respected senior monks, and make a point to try to be of service to Ajahn Kevali (abbot of Wat Nanachat), Ajahn ...
Posted May 30, 2019

I think it’s really important to recollect one’s teachers, both ordinary teachers and Dhamma teachers, as well as one’s parents, because they are all carried into and become part of our citta. This mind is like a stream that absorbs influences from other people. But it’s important to hold this process in the right way. As Luang Por himself would say, ‘Luang Por Sumedho is a perception in the mind’ and ‘There’s no real fixed person there.’ Perceptions of people are impermanent formations that arise in our minds. And yet they can serve as guiding influences. In this way we can...