It was at Magha Puja in 1985 that we launched Angulimala, the Buddhist Prison Chaplaincy Organisation, which means that for twenty-five years we have been working together, Buddhists of various schools and different groups, to make Buddhism available in our prisons. My own involvement in prison chaplaincy goes back to 1977 but by 1985 such was the demand that with others, particularly Yann Lovelock, who had by then been drawn into the work we decided to organise and try to make proper provision in the prisons for Buddhists and those who might be interested in Buddhism and so Angulimala was launched.

Almost since the very beginning Angulimala has benefitted enormously by the loyal and constant support of Lord Avebury who when I asked him all those years ago readily accepted to become a Patron of Angulimala.

I think we have a lot to celebrate. We’ve worked hard, people have been marvellously generous with their time and resources and over the years we have gathered and for the most part kept a remarkable team of very good people who have put up with and overcome all sorts of difficulties and obstacles to make sure Buddhism was available in the prisons they were dedicated to.

So we decided that at our recent Angulimala Workshop that fell just a week after Magha Puja we would celebrate our twenty-fifth anniversary and launch Angulimala’s Silver Jubilee Year. We were delighted that Lord Avebury was able to join us for the day and cut the cake.

You should be hearing some more about Angulimala and its Jubilee Year in the coming months.

Magha Puja this year fell on Sunday, February 28th and we celebrated with a very impressive turnout on such a cold day. It was especially pleasing to see so many students, mostly Thai, from Warwick University  As usual we began with those who wished paying their respects to the Triple Gem and then taking the Refuges and Precepts. Our alms round followed and and as is the custom people gave us a portion of what they’d brought and then shared the rest amongst themselves. After everyone had eaten and after various expressions of generosity that included the offering of requisites and a substantial cash collection, everyone had to listen to a few of my stories of our recent trip to Thailand and my retelling of the story of Magha Puja. I reminded everyone that Magha Puja commemorates an occasion when the Buddha was residing on the Vultures’ Peak and without any prior arrangement a great company of 1,250 of monks, each of whom he had personally ordained and all of whom were Arahants assembled at Veluwana, the Bamboo Grove. It was the Full Moon of the month of Magha and the Buddha came down from the Vultures’ Peak to sit with them through the night and recited for them the Ovada Patimokkha, which contains that celebrated verse, ‘To avoid all evil, cultivate the good and purify the mind, this is the teaching of all the Buddhas!’

This photo is of Khun Ex handing me the Buddha Rupa that had been presented to me by the Cittabhavana Mahamongkon Foundation while I was at Wat Pah Pong in January and which he had kindly brought over for me when he came back himself.

The total for the day’s donations was £1,400, so £700 went into the Forest Hermitage account and £700 towards the paying off of the outstanding debt on Bhavana Dhamma.

On January 10th, Tahn Manapo and I set off for Thailand. As usual we were going to attend the Ajahn Chah Remembrance Day on January 16th, the anniversary of Ajahn Chah’s death in 1992. We spent one night in Bangkok and then the next day a former Warwick student with another in attendance drove us at high speed to Wat Pah Pong. Most people think of this as an eight to ten hour drive but we did it in five hours and forty-five minutes!

With time to spare before the big day we were able to organise a day trip to Sakon Nakon to the museum dedicated to Ajahn Mun, the famous and highly respected monk who revived the Forest tradition and who died in 1949. I had been there a few times before but I hadn’t ever visited the place nearby where a remarkable nun had lived and died. Mae Chee Kaew had been a disciple of Ajahn Mun and by the time she passed away in 1991 she was recognised as an Arahant. Her nunnery is on the way to Sakon Nakon and so we took the opportunity to stop there and admire the tasteful Mae Chee Kaew Memorial Stupa in which her relics are enshrined and where images of her are displayed. From there we went on to the Ajahn Mun Museum and after that we eventually made our to a small temple that I lasted visited with Ajahn Chah in 1977, just before we came to England. This was where Ajahn Kinnerley, one of Ajahn Chah’s teachers, used to live. He was still alive when I went there with Ajahn Chah and I well remember him on other occasions visiting Wat Pah Pong. Ajahn Kinnerley was famous for having walked all the way to India to visit the Holy Places where the Buddha lived and taught and then walking all the way back! After we left there we headed towards the Mekong and the huge, highly venerated chedi of Phra Taht Panom, which as the light changed provided an utterly stunning finale to our day.

On the 16th we took part in the circumambulation of the Ajahn Chah Chedi and then a couple of days later we went to stay with my old friend, Luangpor Dang at Numyeun. He lives with a handful of followers in a very simple and not especially well supported temple set in a large forest. Life there is pretty basic and that together with his direct, no nonsense and humorous approach was very refreshing and made me wonder whether I wouldn’t like to stay longer. But we didn’t and after short stops at Wat Pah Nanachat for a night and Bangkok for another we soon found ourselves on the island of Phuket where once again we were welcomed and cared for at Sri Panwa. There I planned to shut the gate on our villa and have a few days complete rest but we did venture out on a couple of short excursions.

On our first evening we went to pay our respects to Luangpor Supah who must be the oldest monk in the world. His birth certificate says he is over 113 years old but he says that actually his birth wasn’t registered until he was two and so he is in fact a hundred and fifteen! I must say I hope I’m as sharp as him at 115, or even at 113!

Our second trip was an afternoon boat ride that ended on an uninhabited island that we could see from our villa. This little island, I couldn’t help thinking, was the perfect setting for a tiny, one monk, retirement temple! But while we lingered there I caught the sun and got badly sunburnt.

After a few days on Phuket we returned to Bangkok for a night and to meet a few friends and former students and then it was back on a plane to England and Warwickshire – and the cold and the snow.

There are some more pictures here.

Sorry about this, I’ve only just woken up to realising that I haven’t updated my blog for ages and in the meantime Christmas and New Year have crept by. As you might imagine, Christmas at the Forest Hermitage isn’t exactly a riotous occasion, in fact we didn’t see anyone apart from Tahn Manapo’s Mum who popped in with roast potatoes, parsnips and other seasonal fare. And I’m afraid I didn’t even see her. Yes it was a very quiet and peaceful few days. New Year was a bit different, still not riotous mind! We had our traditional New Year’s Eve vigil with its brief ‘letting go’ ceremony at midnight as we chanted the parittas. Quite a few turned up for this, as well as the group who by then had begun a short retreat at Bhavana Dhamma. On New Year’s Day in the morning quite a crowd arrived to offer food and there was a steady procession of visitors afterwards that kept me in my seat until about 3 o’clock. The following day, the 2nd, we had a coach come from London bearing a party that Khun Peter had organised from his restaurant in Marylebone to offer a Tort Pa Bah. They were joined by some of our more local supporters and devotees and on such a cold day we were packed inside our relatively small building. I’m pleased to report that over these two days our funds received a significant boost with £623.60 donated on the 1st and £1,055 on the 2nd from Khun Peter’s group. While he was here, Khun Peter took the opportunity to book another Tort Pah Bah for October 23rd, the last day of Vassa, and to suggest that once a month on a Sunday, probably the first Sunday in the month, either I or Tahn Manapo could come to his restaurant in Marylebone to eat and afterwards give a Dhamma talk. This seemed like too good an opportunity to miss and so from February that will be happening.

Now I must get on because later today, snow, ice, health and the aircraft permitting, Tahn Manapo and I are off to Thailand for our annual visit for the Ajahn Chah Memorial Day at Wat Pah Pong on the 16th, as well as a little rest and respite from our activities at the Forest Hermitage. We are due back early on the morning of Sunday, January 31st. In the meantime, in our absence, hopefully things will go on here as usual with the Monday, Wednesday and Friday evening meditation sessions as usual.

So, a belated but Very Happy New Year to one and all.

The Angulimala Workshop on December 5th, the King of Thailand’s birthday and Father’s Day in Thailand, was scarcely over and I was in the car en route for Heathrow, Suwanabhumi and Ubon. Fortunately not only had Khun Pom smoothed things for me this end but to ensure that I made my tight connection at Suwanabhumi she had requested staff there to assist me, which meant that at almost every opportunity someone popped up with a wheelchair. Of course it wasn’t that that I needed but help to find my way as quickly as possible through Immigration and Customs and up to Domestic Check In and the flight to Ubon. Happily, with their help I made it with time to spare. At Ubon Ajahn Cittagutto was there with the Wat car to meet me and when I arrived at Wat Pah Nanachat it was to find everyone assembled ready for a short ceremony with Ajahn Liam, the Abbot of Wat Pah Pong, to commence our series of meetings.

It was an almost unprecedented gathering of senior monks from around the world and a revelation for at least one observer watching the forgiveness ceremony with which we began to realise that showing and paying respects is still a duty of even senior monks. The only difference is that the older you get the fewer there are senior to you to pay respects to!

The details of the meetings I hardly remember but the sense of harmony and togetherness was impressive and very moving. As well as the older monks who I’ve known for years there were some I hadn’t met before and a few who I hardly know but it was a joy and even fun to be with them all and a real privilege to be there.

I felt that I couldn’t be away any longer than necessary so I only had a couple of days free at the end. On one of these I paid a visit to my old and very dear friend Ajahn Dang and on the way back called at Peter and Thippawan’s for tea out of real bone china teacups. The day after we went to Poo Jom Gon and climbed up for that great view of the Mekhong and on the way called at the island wat where Ajahn Sao’s kuti and memorial can be seen.

A bit too soon really I had to come back but I shall be off again in a couple of weeks. In fact this is just about the half way point between trips. The next one is the usual annual visit for Ajahn Chah’s memorial and a little break that I feel I need. In the meantime we have our New Year’s Eve event on the 31st and a Tort Pah Bah on January 2nd and then a week chock full of prison visits.

More pictures are here.

Tomorrow we have the last this year of Angulimala’s quarterly workshops for Buddhist Prison Chaplains. It’s going to be a full day and not one that can go on quite as long as usual. We begin at 10 o’clock in the morning with meditation. Then we have various things to discuss and in the afternoon we have the Buddhist Quiz. We’re going to try to finish by 4:30 and then have a committee meeting. Hopefully that will leave me time to finish my packing and be out the door around 6 o’clock. Yes, I shall be off to Heathrow and Thailand. I will only be away a little over a week. I’m due back on the morning of the 14th. I’m attending the meeting of the Western Abbots of Wat Pah Pong branches at Wat Pah Nanachat.

This was the scene a week ago Sunday at the end of our very charming Supporters’ Day. The Buddha-Dhamma Fellowship has to have an AGM every year but I’m afraid that these are not crowd-pulling occasions, so this year we decided to make a bit more of it and try to bring more of our supporters together for a good chunk of the day to get to know each other and hopefully to get to understand a bit more about the Buddha-Dhamma Fellowship and why it’s necessary.

After the meal I gave a short explanation of how the temple and the BDF had come about and my vision of the BDF as an opportunity for the laity to enhance their practice of Dana, Sila and Bhavana by weaving in their support and care for the Forest Hermitage.

The AGM itself was relatively painless and provided us with a refreshed committee and of course it was a chance to thank everyone for what they do. We may not have the numbers but our supporters certainly excel in quality. Anumodana!

I had an email the other day apologising for my name being included on that petition. I’m afraid that whoever wrote it had neither the good manners nor the courage to give their names. They apologised and then told me that it was impossible to remove my name from the on-line version of the petition but they will not include it in the printed version that they intend to present to us at our meeting next week in Thailand.

I have since complained to iPetitions who provide the software and whose site is hosting this petition but so far without any satisfaction.

Unlike the old fashioned petition that occasionally you might be asked to sign by someone in the street and which then had your handwritten signature and often your address on it, this modern version of a petition is just a list of printed names with in some cases the town and country where the person bearing that name is supposed to live.

Although the petition sponsors claim that the names have been verified and are genuine it is impossible for anyone else, including those to whom it is addressed, to check them. And we know for a fact that at least one name has been forged.

I have always believed that the bhikkhuni ordination could not be revived in the Theravada and that to attempt to do so would become divisive and unpleasant and likely have little or nothing to do with the path to liberation. I knew that bhikkhuni ordination was on the agenda for the meeting of Western abbots that had been scheduled for Australia in December and I was prepared to go and to listen to the arguments and even to be persuaded by them but what has happened since the alleged ordination of bhikkhunis in Western Australia last month has proved that I have been right to think as I do.

I have voiced my disapproval of Ajahn Brahm’s actions in going ahead with that ceremony and naturally followed events as they’ve unfolded. I have read Ajahn Sujato’s blog of course and there I have seen that an on-line petition has been organised ‘calling for bhikkhuni ordination and gender equality in the Forest Sangha’. There are a lot of names on it, some of them quite well known, but how many are genuine signatures and how many whose names are on it know that their names are on it I don’t know. I certainly didn’t know that my name was on page 24!

My advice is to drop all this nonsense and get back to practising Dhamma.

I am not long back from a long day travelling through heavy traffic to London and back. I went to take part in a multifaith event to celebrate Prisoners’ Sunday. This was the third year running that something like this has happened. The first year it was held in the chapel of Wormwood Scrubs Prison, last year it was in a Sikh Gurudwara and this year it was in a church, All Hallows by the Tower. I’m not sure whether there was any more to the choosing of this particular church than that it was available, but significantly it is close to probably our oldest and at times most terrible prison.

Because of the traffic I arrived a bit late but I was able to make my contribution with the story of Angulimala and participate in the joint act of commitment.

Unfortunately, very few attended, hardly any who weren’t taking an active part, and I couldn’t help feeling that such a great opportunity to promote care and understanding of prisoners had been lost. Really this should have been a national event with the Minister for Prisons present, together with Prison Service hierarchy and all sorts of people who work in prisons and who care about prisoners. Perhaps next year.

It ended with our standing together, men and women of different religions, and reciting in unison these words:

We come from many Faith traditions.
Together we care for those people held in our prisons, for those who work
in our prisons and all we can for the victims of crime.

We commit ourselves afresh, as friends and colleagues,
to provide opportunities for all to grow and develop
into men and women of integrity who are
strong and confident, learned, wise and truthful,
free from crime and from the fear of crime.

We are united in our desire to work for the common good,
and to continue to work together in trust, in peace and in harmony
in a spirit of friendship and goodwill
in confidence that it will bear fruit
in the lives of many.