We will celebrate New Year’s Eve and New Year’s Day at Abhayagiri Monastery. On New Year’s Eve there will be a ceremonial almsround at the monastery. New year’s day being Wan Phra, the monks will follow their usual almsround in Ukiah and Redwood Valley.

December 31 (New Year’s Eve)

9:45 am – Arrive
10:15 am – Monks’ Almsround at the monastery (ceremonial food offerings made directly into the monks’ bowls) *
10:45 am – Meal Offering (please bring a dish to share)
11:00 am – Blessing

2:00 pm – Afternoon Puja and Dhamma Talk
5:30 pm – Tea Time
7:30 pm – Evening Puja and possible Dhamma Talk
9:00 pm to 11:30pm – Walking or Sitting Meditation
11:30 pm – Paritta Chanting
12:01 am – Sharing the Merit

January 1 (Wan Phra, New Year’s Day)

8:00 to 10:30 am – Monk’s almsround in Ukiah and Redwood Valley
10:45 am – Meal offering at the monastery
7:30 pm – Evening Puja, Eight Precepts and Dhamma Talk
9:00 pm to … – Late Night Vigil

* For the ceremonial almsround on December 31st, please offer any kind of rice (white, brown, etc). Dry goods and other requisites can be placed on the Dana Table to be offered to the monks. Cooked food will be offered to the monks in the kitchen at 10:45 am. Please do not put money, checks, or canned foods into the monks’ bowls.

As the end of the year draws near and the Abhayagiri community prepares for Winter Retreat, there is still much trail maintenance and fire prevention work to do in the forest. We will therefore focus on working in the forest this weekend and have canceled the usual 2 pm Sunday program on Dec. 10. You are welcome to join us for the Sunday work afternoon, which will begin at 1 pm.

For those interested in Dhamma teachings this weekend, please come to the Upasika Day on Saturday, Dec. 9 or the Lunar Observance Evening which begins at 7:30 pm on Monday, Dec. 11.

On November 14th, 2017, Abhayagiri ordained Jordan as an anagārika. In addition, 2 sāmaṇeras: Rakkhito and Cittapālo (formerly anagārikas Gary and Ryan, respectively), were ordained 1 week later, on November 21st, 2017.

In case you missed them, you can watch the ordinations here:

We also have photos from Rakkhito and Cittapālo’s ordination:

Sāmaṇera Ordination of Anagārikas Gary and Ryan

And finally, a brief bio of each of the new ordainees:

Tan Rakkhito

Tan Rakkhito was born in 1961 in New Jersey. He lived most of his adult life in Oregon. As a young man he was drawn to the samana life he found in books, but at the time he was not able to follow that path. Many years later, after a life in the world, a timely reading of Bhikkhu Bodhi’s In the Buddha’s Words inspired him to once again explore monasticism. He found accord with the beloved and respected teacher Luang Por Pasanno, along with the Dhamma-rich Thai Forest Sangha. Tan Rakkhito took Anagārika precepts in November 2016, went forth as a Sāmaṇera in November 2017, and took full Bhikkhu precepts on November 4, 2018.

Tan Cittapālo

Tan Cittapālo was born and raised in the state of Maine. He first encountered Buddhism in 2011 during his gap year in Thailand. It wasn’t until a chance crossing of the collection of Ajahn Chah teachings, Food for the Heart, while back home, though, that he discovered Abhayagiri. In 2016 he served the winter retreat as a volunteer. Finding a connection with the community, he returned later that year and took up the first ordination as an Anāgārika, followed by the Sāmaṇera training the following year later. Tan Cittapālo took full Bhikkhu ordination on August 25th, 2019, with Ajahn Pasanno as his preceptor.

We hope you can join us at Abhayagiri Buddhist Monastery for the next Upasika Day on Saturday, December 9, a day of community, Dhamma study, meditation, and renewal. All are welcome, whether or not you have attended these teaching days before.

Our theme for the day will be: Practice in Daily Life: Working With High-Dose Dukkha. Senior monastics of Abhayagiri have graciously offered to lead us in an exploration of strategies to deal with very stressful times in life.

The day’s schedule will be:

10:30 am - Refuges and Precepts
10:45 am - Meal offering (bring a dish to share if you would like)
1:00 pm - Meditation, teachings & discussion
4:30 pm - Tea with monastics (optional)

More information about Upasika Days can be found here.

If you are unable to attend in person, you are invited to join in the live-stream through the following link: https://youtu.be/Cf3RZ_Y_l70

On November 21st, all are welcome to attend the ceremony in which Anagārikas Gary and Ryan will ordain as Sāmaṇeras or novices. The ceremony will take place in the Reception Hall and will be livestreamed at:
https://youtu.be/FjIcJNPvxtc

The program will begin with evening puja at 7:00 PM. The ordination ceremony will likely start between 8:15–8:45 PM.

Please see our calendar for additional details.

All 26 talks given by Ajahn Pasanno, Ajahn Karunadhammo, Ajahn Sudanto, and Debbie Stamp at the 2016 Thanksgiving Monastic Retreat in Santa Rosa, California from November 18 to November 27 are available for online browsing, on our talks page, can be downloaded as a 586 MB zip file, and requested as an MP3 CD.

On November 14th, Long-term resident Jordan will take on the white robes of an anagārika. You are welcome to join for the beginning of his monastic training and hear Ajahn Pasanno’s advice for those embarking on the monastic path.

Puja will begin as usual at 7:00 pm, followed by the ceremony around 8:00-8:30 pm.

As the Tomki Road work crews are starting to lessen, we are now allowing visitors to start coming back to the monastery, and look forward to seeing our friends and supporters once again.

However, our trails will remain closed to the public due to potential dangers, until we can do more trail maintenance and also see how the rains will affect them.

When driving down East Road, West Road, and Tomki Road, we ask you to observe the following:

• Drive slowly and safely, respecting any work crews.
• Do not stop or pull over to look at damaged areas—come directly to the monastery.
• Be aware of other vehicles and workers on the road especially on narrow stretches.

Once again, we appreciate all of the kindness and concern you all have given to us, and also appreciate your patience in waiting to come visit until now. We are looking forward to resuming our normal activities and schedules, including the Sunday afternoon meditation and talk at 2:00 pm.

The Abhayagiri residents are now back on the property, and we have been joined by two of our close friends and supporters, Dee and Sondra, who both lost their houses in the fire. They will be staying with us as they sort out where they will want to eventually reside and how they will be rebuilding their homes. Other friends in the area who experienced losses are also slowly starting to piece things together again. There are many work crews along Tomki Road, repairing utilities, trimming back trees, and engaging in general cleanup—we expect this will take an extended period of time.

We were extraordinarily fortunate to have experienced no damage to any of our structures, except possibly minimal damage to one of our ridge water tanks. There are likely many reasons for this blessing, with most of the credit going to the excellent work done by the multiple fire-fighting crews from many different areas. We also believe there must have been some very powerful protective forces on the property looking after the monastery as we had fires coming from several directions that seemed to unexpectedly reverse direction.

On a more mundane level, we feel that the fire protection measures that we took prior to the fire (defensible clearances around buildings, trail maintenance, fire breaks, emergency procedures, etc.) were also very helpful. One thing we learned from this fire is that even with the extensive measures we have taken, we need to do more.

Because of the damage to the forest, we have closed our trails to public access until further notice, as there are potential dangers from falling dead trees and erosion after the fire.

Many of our friends have been asking how they can help us at this time. As a result of the fire, we would like to maintain and widen some of our trails, as they provided access for the fire-fighters and some of the wider trails worked as fire breaks and prevented spread of the fire on the property. We would also like to continue to extend the defensible areas around cabins with more brush clearance.

These fire prevention and trail maintenance projects are beyond what our resident community can do, and we will need to hire help for doing this. We have talked with the California Conservation Corps in the past to do some trail work, but had to postpone it due to lack of funds. Consequently, we have decided to set up a fund for this work for anyone who would like to contribute towards the future maintenance and fire safety measures in our forest.

Over the next few weeks and months, we will look forward to slowly resuming our regular routines, and keeping an eye out for ways to improve the conditions on the property for both residents and visitors. Our appreciation for all of your well-wishes and gestures of support is beyond measure, and we look forward to reconnecting with all of you.

The above two photos show an area on our ridge where we did brush clearing last year. In the second photo, taken on October 20, 2017, you can see the results of the fire that approached the side to the right of the road. The trees to the left of the road experienced little to no fire damage. According to several firefighters whom we spoke with, most of the ridge experienced a great loss of trees in part due to the brush being too thick.

Ever since news spread regarding the fires affecting the Abhayagiri community, many people have been asking how they can offer support and assistance. About a week ago, we posted a news article suggesting the offering of gift cards from a nearby grocery store.

In the past few days, we have received an overwhelming number of gift cards. The Abhayagiri community is deeply appreciative and we would like to share our gratitude for people’s generosity.

At present, the gift cards we have received are sufficient for our needs.

We recognize that there may still be interest in offering support to the Abhayagiri community in response to the Redwood Valley fires. We are currently considering other options and, once it becomes clearer as to what might be helpful, we plan to share this information on our website.

In the meantime, for those who wish to support our many neighbors who have already lost their homes along Tomki Road and throughout the Redwood Valley area, the local Community Foundation of Mendocino County provides a means to do so at http://www.communityfound.org/.