Winter Retreat Uposatha Programs 2024

"Practicing for Stream Entry"

The Dhammadharini community will be in retreat for the Winter rainy season, from January 8th to March 31st —  a three month time for silence and deeper practice. We warmly welcome you to join along with the monastic community, and experience the benefits of this practice opportunity.

We encourage everyone who can to join in undertaking a practice commitment together during this year's winter retreat, from near and far, wherever you are. We invite you to commit to a practice for this time - this could be as small or as large as you wish. If your life circumstances allow, you are invited to follow along with the Dhammadharini community for the full retreat, joining our online teachings together.

In support of this, we will offer monthly Uposatha moon day teachings throughout the winter retreat, especially for those who join in the practice commitment together.

Since the Buddha’s time, on the Full Moon and New Moon days, monastics and householders have gathered on the Uposatha. The monastics recite their precepts and listen to Dhamma talks, and dedicated lay practitioners undertake the Three Refuges and Eight Uposatha Precepts for one day, including evening fasting, celibacy and abstaining from adornment and entertainment. They have a daylong retreat, spending the day in sustained mindfulness and meditation, and listening to Dhamma teachings.

On each Uposatha day, there will be two offerings. We encourage you to join live on Zoom, or on YouTube, or as much and as often as you can:

• 7:30 - 8:30 am: Three Refuges and the Eight Uposatha Precepts, followed by a guided meditation
• 7:00 - 9:00 pm: Full Moon Night Meditation, Dhamma Reflection, and Dhamma Discussion

The times above are given in Pacific Standard Time for California, USA. Please use a time zone converter for your local times. All of the events will be live on Zoom, and also streamed on YouTube.com | Dhammadharini Monastery, and Facebook.com/Dhammadharini  so you can watch at your suitable time.

In between these online sessions, you will be invited to continue your meditation and mindfulness throughout the day.

Final Uposatha program: Monday 3/25: "The Character of the Stream Enterer"

The Phagguṇa Punnamī (Phālguna Purnima) Medin Poya Day Full Moon,  marks the Buddha's First Return to Kapilavastu, AND Mahāpajāpatī Gotamī & Suddhodana Rāja’s Stream Entry Day.

This year there is also something new for us, as we learn about and share the "HerStory" of the ancient Women Disciples of the Buddha. We've learned that this Phagguṇa Punnamī full moon Uposatha has also been passed down in Pāli-text manuscript traditions long-preserved in southern, central and northern Thailand, as the date of the Parinibbāna of the same Rāhulamātā Bimbā Yasodhara - by then for decades renowned as one of the Buddha's long-established and outstanding fully awakened arahat disciples, established by the Buddha as his bhikkhunī disciple "foremost in attainment of great direct knowledge" (mahābhiññapattānam): the venerable Bhaddā Kaccānā Therī. Here at Dhammadharini, Ayya Tathālokā Therī* (and we) learned of these long-standing Pāli manuscript traditions--and recorded within them this very special commemorative date--just on the eve of entering our winter retreat this year. So, this year will be a launching of awareness and remembrance for us--an enormously powerful time for reflecting on Nibbāna. A most suitable conclusion to Women's History Month, and to our focus on stream entry, with its natural culmination in the ultimate, Parinibbāna.

Please register below to join us! 

We hope that you will be able to join us in our three month long winter retreat practice, by following our schedule of teachings and practicing from your monastery, home, or wherever you may be.

For information on offering Dāna of requisites to the Bhikkhunīs and/or supporting our Dhammadharini teachers and monastic  community, welcome to see the Dhammadharini Support Foundation page on dhammadharini.net