GRATITUDE, EXPRESSING GRATITUDE, VOLUNTEERS AND GENEROSITY

We want to thank those of our general Sangha who have helped with Sunyata over the past several weeks.

Our personal thanks goes out to a remarkable volunteer who came, after 9PM on Thursday night, to spend hours helping us to get the meditation hall ready for the beginning of Friday's retreat and to put together the furniture in the Dorm area and the Bodhi Room area. That man is none other than former board member Gurmukh Bimbra and we thank him for Ajahn Vajiro, for those who were able to attend the retreat, and for us who faced an exceptionally unusual challenge. Close on his heels was our Friday morning Bodhisattva, Philip O'Dea, who helped Bart put together the bed for Ajahn Vajiro and move furniture between the farmhouse and the Bodhi Room. After Phillip left we were joined by John Collins, his wife Kathleen and daughter Marie, without whose last minute help we could not have been ready for the retreat. Finally, we are grateful to Donal Quirke who made a special effort to pick up an oversized shower curtain in Limerick for the bathroom in the Dorm area. Without the effort of all of these folks, we would have had great difficulty in getting the retreat off to a relatively smooth start.

We in addition want to thank the numerous volunteers who helped the prior weekend to help make Sunyata "shipshape" for the Easter retreat. On Saturday the 7th of May we are told that the following people volunteered to help with preparing the centre and we want to thank old friends and folks we do not know for your generous help: Caroline Hannon, Mairead Burke, Carmel McMahon, Kathleen Moroney, Eoghan Ó Loinsigh, Andrea Martin, Donal Quirke, and Padraig Cotter. We are also grateful to Shane who volunteered on Sunday morning to drive for several hours help.

On the weekend earlier, 2nd / 3rd May, also thank those who volunteered on the first volunteer weekend of 2011. We are told there was major progress in painting the Dhamma Hall, tiling and painting the dorms, along with cleaning and clearing the paths and gardens. Reportedly the sun shone - with the exception of a few April showers. You came from far and near and we are told you included Ciaran and Xuan, Neil Mulrooney, Padraig Cotter, Heather Prichard, Carmel McMahon, Kathleen Moroney, Eileen O'Connor, Pat Punch, the indomitable painter Billy, and electrician John Coakley who volunteered hours of his amazing electrical skill and ability.. The indefatigable Eileen, wanting to touch up an area with paint before lunch, tumbled off a ladder and broke her wrist. We all wish her a speedy recovery.

NEWS UPDATE: Places Still Available in the Retreat by Ajahn Kalyano

At this moment there are still a couple of available places on Ajahn Kalyano's weekend retreat that begins this Friday, 13th of May, at 6:30 PM. Concessions are available. This will be a grand retreat not only because Ajahn Kalyano is a wonderful teacher, but because those on the retreat will be able to witness a traditional Sri Lankan dana ceremony as well as witness a tudong with a monk and a samenara. Despite all these events, the retreat will be held in silence. Please note, as we announced in the last newsletter and as we have put on our website, you will not be asked for an additional monetary offering (dana) at the end of the retreat.

NEWS UPDATE: Mindfulness Based Stress Reduction (MBSR)

The Tuesday MBSR course here at Sunyata and taught forSunyata had a wonderful opening class but, because of a lack of numbers, this course has been cancelled. There will be another course by the same teacher beginning this Thursday at 7PM at St. Flannons in Ennis. Be at the front door by 7PM. Please RSVP if you have not already.

DANA PRACTICE WHEN WE HOST MONKS AND NUNS HERE AT SUNYATA

The word "dana" means generosity and it had been a traditional practice to end each retreat with a "dana" talk requesting funds for the teacher. We have done this atSunyata for every retreat except those taught by our own resident teachers. Marion and Bart. The standard dana contributions went to the teacher/s who had just led the retreat. We also invited contributions for Sunyata, and we still do that.

In our last newsletter, we clarified the new dana practice for Forest Tradition monks and nuns. These monastics can't receive dana themselves and so we will not ask for it. The "official" reason for dana was to encourage people to develop generosity. We still very urge everyone to work to develop generosity, since it is an important step on the path to liberation (along with metta-loving kindness; karuna-compassion; mudita-happiness at the good fortune of others; upekkha-equanimity). You can intuitively understand how all of these form a "package" of attitudes that foster being a happier and more enlightened person. Dana is crucial to this development but does not require giving money or physical gifts to anyone.

In the last newsletter we urgedeach of you to move in the direction of generosity as well as you are able. Be generous with your family, your loved ones, your friends, the poor, people you meet, people who are doing service jobs--house cleaning, waiters, flight attendants, taxi drivers, store clerks--as well as with organizations you want to support. Practicing generosity is the way to become a generous being. Try sharing a kind word, a smile, a "thank you," or a compliment; try helping someone with something, volunteering for an organization, giving even a tiny gift to someone, or donating to a cause/organization you would like to support. Give freely. Develop the heart. That creates real happiness.

Those who have volunteered above were acting out of generosity. In verified scientific studies, the activities that make people the happiest are volunteer activities! Perhaps we will provide more on that study in our next newsletter.

We promised in the last newsletter to say a bit more on the dana practice we now have at Sunyata for monks and nuns. The following is from "No Strings Attached: The Buddha's Culture of Generosity" by Thanissaro Bhikkhu:

"How can I ever repay you for your teaching?"

Good meditation teachers often hear this question from their students, and the best answer I know for it is one that my teacher, Ajaan Fuang, gave every time: "By being intent on practicing."

Each time he gave this answer, I was struck by how noble and gracious it was. And it wasn't just a formality. He never tried to find opportunities to pressure his students for donations. Even when our monastery was poor, he never acted poor, never tried to take advantage of their gratitude and trust. This was a refreshing change from some of my previous experiences with run-of-the-mill village and city monks who were quick to drop hints about their need for donations from even stray or casual visitors.

Eventually I learned that Ajaan Fuang's behavior is common throughout the Forest Tradition. It's based on a passage in the Pali Canon where the Buddha on his deathbed states that the highest homage to him is not material homage, but the homage of practicing the Dhamma in accordance with the Dhamma. In other words, the best way to repay a teacher is to take the Dhamma to heart and to practice it in a way that fulfills his or her compassionate purpose in teaching it. I was proud to be part of a tradition where the inner wealth of this noble idea was actually lived - where, as Ajaan Fuang often put it, we weren't reduced to hirelings, and the act of teaching the Dhamma was purely a gift.

So I was saddened when, on my return to America, I had my first encounters with the dana talk: the talk on giving and generosity that often comes at the end of a retreat. The context of the talk - and often the content - makes clear that it's not a disinterested exercise. It's aimed at generating gifts for the teacher or the organization sponsoring the retreat, and it places the burden of responsibility on the retreatants to ensure that future retreats can occur. The language of the talk is often smooth and encouraging, but when contrasted with Ajaan Fuang's answer, I found the sheer fact of the talk ill-mannered and demeaning. If the organizers and teachers really trusted the retreatants' good-heartedness, they wouldn't be giving the talk at all. To make matters worse, the typical dana talk - along with its companion, the meditation-center fundraising letter - often cites the example of how monks and nuns are supported in Asia as justification for how dana is treated here in the West. But they're taking as their example the worst of the monks, and not the best....

We tend not to associate codes of conduct with the word "freedom," but that's because we forget that freedom, too, needs protection, especially from the attitude that wants to be free in its choices but feels insecure when others are free in theirs. The Buddha's codes of conduct are voluntary - he never coerced anyone into practicing his teachings - but once they are adopted, they require the cooperation of both sides to keep them effective and strong.

These codes are best understood in terms of the six factors that the Buddha said exemplified the ideal gift:

"The donor, before giving, is glad; while giving, his/her mind is inspired; and after giving, is gratified. These are the three factors of the donor...

"The recipients are free of passion or are practicing for the subduing of passion; free of aversion or practicing for the subduing of aversion; and free of delusion or practicing for the subduing of delusion. These are the three factors of the recipients" ...

If we're serious about bringing the culture of dana to the West, we should be very careful to ensure that our efforts honor the principles that make dana a genuinely Buddhist practice. This means no longer using the tactics of modern fundraising to encourage generosity among retreatants or Buddhists in general. It also means rethinking the dana talk, for on many counts it fails the test. In pressuring retreatants to give to teachers, it doesn't lead to gladness before giving, and instead sounds like a plea for a tip at the end of a meal. The frequent efforts to pull on the retreatants' heartstrings as a path to their purse strings betray a lack of trust in their thoughtfulness and leave a bad taste. And the entire way dana is handled for teachers doesn't escape the fact that it's payment for services rendered. Whether teachers think about this consciously or not, it pressures them subtly to tell their listeners what they think their listeners want to hear. The Dhamma can't help but suffer as a result.

The ideal solution would be to provide a framework whereby serious Dhamma practitioners could be supported whether or not they taught. That way, the act of teaching would be a genuine gift. In the meantime, though, a step in the direction of a genuine culture of dana would be to declare a moratorium on all dana talks at the end of retreats, and on references to the Buddhist tradition of dana in fundraising appeals, so as to give the word time to recover its dignity.

On retreats, dana could be discussed in a general way, in the context of the many Dhamma talks given on how best to integrate Dhamma practice in daily life. At the end of the retreat, a basket could be left out for donations, with a note that the teacher hasn't been paid to teach the retreat. That's all. No appeals for mercy. No flashcards. Sensitive retreatants will be able to put two and two together, and will feel glad, inspired, and gratified that they were trusted to do the math for themselves."

For those who would like to read this talk in its entirety, please go to:

http://www.accesstoinsight.org/lib/authors/thanissaro/nostringsattached.html

We wish you well during our spring showers,

Blessings,

Bart and Marion