Venerables Cunda and Bodhidhaja visit BAMBI this November ’23

Venerables Cunda and Bodhidhaja visit BAMBI this November '23

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Venerable Cunda and Venerable Bodhidhaja will be visiting BAMBI and the South-West during November 2023. They will be teaching each Sunday from 9am for the first three Sundays. The theme of their workshops will be “Skilled in Goodness: Exploring Virtues on the Path to Peace”.(See the calendar below for details.)

When and where?

  • MARGARET RIVER
    • Sunday 5th November @ The Chapel of the Margaret River Community Centre with Venerable Cunda and Venerable Bodhidhaja for guided meditation and a dhamma discussion on topic “Skilled in Goodness: exploring virtues on the path to peace”.
  • BUSSELTON
    • Sunday 12th November @ Busselton Senior Citizens Centre with Venerable Cunda and Venerable Bodhidhaja for guided meditation and a dhamma discussion on topic “Skilled in Goodness: exploring virtues on the path to peace”.
  • NANNUP
    • Sunday 19th November  @ Nannup Recreation & Community Centre with Venerable Cunda and Venerable Bodhidhaja for guided meditation and a dhamma discussion on topic “Skilled in Goodness: exploring virtues on the path to peace”.

Note that all Sunday sessions start at 9am, conclude no later than 10.30am and usually involve:
  • a half hour guided meditation
  • a half hour talk on Buddhist practices like meditation, loving-kindness, virtue, how to overcome personal difficulties, etc.
  • a half hour discussion session

 

Can you help lend a hand?

Venerable Cunda and Venerable Bodhidhaja will be visiting BAMBI and the South-West during November 2023. They will be teaching each Sunday from 9am for the first three Sundays. Click the link to see a calendar (and then click ‘week’ and go forward to November). Buddhist monks don’t charge any money – in fact they are not even allowed to have any money! – but they are reliant upon the community to support their material needs. And principally that means we need to make sure they are well fed every day.

We really need volunteers to offer dana (a food offering) each day from Monday to Saturday for the duration of their stay. If you are able to offer food please let me know and I’ll try to offer the information you need to offer food to the monks (try to arrive by 10.30 to offer food 15 minutes after that).

Food offering is really quite straight forward. Firstly people ask, “What food should we make for them?” The answer is make the kind of healthy, yummy food that you like eating. Remember that this is their main meal of the day and they won’t be eating again until the next day, so if you are able, it is good to make a decent amount of food. In this case, you might want to aim to make enough for at least two people, keeping in mind that anything that the monks don’t eat, you can eat yourself. In addition to a main meal (e.g. curry and rice; a pasta dish) you may want to also include so cut up fruit and/or a dessert, just as you might do for a main meal if you were having guests over.

The second most common question is, “How do we offer the food?” This is generally quite simple though customs vary a bit from place to place. Here in the South-West we have most commonly started by putting all the dishes on the table provided. We recommend bringing serving spoons so that either you can serve directly into the monk’s bowl or the whole table can be “offered” (meaning you lift the table slightly as the monk receives it into his own hand), and then the monks can serve themselves.

“So where is it?” From Monday through Saturday on each of the two weeks the monks will be staying with us they will be at Christine’s Retreat which is 631 Rocky Rd. Take it easy on the dirt roads as there is a loose surface. There is a sign near the entrance. Follow the drive way through to the large rural shed where the food will be offered. The monks should be waiting by 10.30am and there will be a chance to chat to the monks either before or after the meal. Please do NOT leave any food behind as it is not required and tends to just fill up the fridge and then end up in the bin. So please take any food or anything brought down with you back with you.

“How do I sign up to offer sangha dana?” Technically, there’s no need to sign up, you can just go. However, it would aid our organisation and ensure that there are people coming every day if you could take a look at the BAMBI calendar. If you can go on a day when there are question marks (instead of names) that would really help. Please email sol@bswa.org to let me know what day you would like to offer food and I’ll add your name to the calendar so that we know that that day is covered. I can also answer any questions that you have.