Dear OI Friends, OI Aspirants and Dharma Teachers, (June 2021)

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Blue Cliff Monastery is honored to host the Online OI Retreat this year in collaboration with Deer Park Monastery and Magnolia Monastery. We have the support from the Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation for technical aspects of the program. With this support, we hope that our online activities will improve.

Please mark your calendar for the North American OI Retreat 2021,

June 24-27 (Thursday to Sunday)

Dear Mother Earth, a Lunar New Year prayer

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Dear Moth­er Earth, we see that we and all our an­cestors are your chil­dren. With your pa­tience, sta­bil­i­ty, en­durance and cre­ativ­i­ty you have nour­ished us and guid­ed us through many life­times. You have giv­en birth to count­less Great Be­ings, Buddhas, Saints, and Bod­hisattvas. You are the great Earth, you are Ter­ra, you are Gaia, you are this beau­ti­ful blue plan­et. You are the Earth Re­fresh­ing Bod­hisatt­va—fra­grant, cool, and kind. We see that al­though we and our an­ces­tors have made many mis­takes, you have al­ways for­giv­en us. Each time we re­turn to you, you are ready to open your arms and em­brace us.

Due to our wrong per­cep­tions and dis­crim­i­na­tion, we have lived a life of sep­a­ra­tion, ha­tred, lone­li­ness, suffer­ing, and de­spair. This year has brought new and unforeseen chal­lenges. The Covid-19 pan­dem­ic contin­ues to rage across the globe, and in its wake we strug­gle to re­main calm and free from delu­sion. We have allowed in­di­vid­u­al­ism to pre­vail, and it has caused se­vere dam­age and hard­ship to you and to our­selves. By con­tin­u­ing to run af­ter fame, wealth, pow­er, and sen­su­al plea­sures—for­get­ting that these pur­suits can nev­er bring us true hap­pi­ness—we neglect to heal and trans­form our own suf­fer­ing and the col­lec­tive suf­fer­ing. Without such heal­ing and transfor­ma­tion, fear and racism en­grained deeply in the fab­ric of our so­ci­ety and its in­sti­tu­tions will con­tin­ue to com­pound old wounds with fresh wounds…………..Read further in English.
Read the entire prayer in Vietnamese.