Rejoice in all the Dharma activities you helped to support last year!

The web version of our 2024 annual report includes a message from Abbess Ven. Thubten Chodron and highlights from the year. To protect our donor’s privacy, their names, along with the 2024 financial report, are not included.

A Message from Founder & Abbess Bhikshuni Thubten Chodron

The Buddha Hall was the major project at the Abbey in 2024, although it wasn’t the only one. After many years of dreaming and five years of active planning, building, and inviting your support, we received the Buddha Hall occupancy permit January 29, 2025. What a joy it will be to offer the first retreat in the spaciousness of the Buddha Hall!

The Abbey needed skies of merit to even begin this noble venture, and the good wishes, earnest prayers, and financial support of thousands of people worldwide to complete it. While there is more to do in 2025 to furnish and landscape this new temple—with its multiple meditation and teaching rooms, library, media room, and offices—we can all rejoice. Together, we have built the Buddha Hall.

Rooting the Dharma in the West

One part of our mission states, “We seek to preserve Buddha’s teachings, to root them deeply in Western soil, to share them with others, to build an enduring sangha, and to serve sentient beings for as long as space remains.” The day the roof ornaments were installed on the Buddha Hall, I realized how far we had come with that aim.

As the Genie-lift raised the traditional deer and Dharma wheel figures into place above the entrance, I was deeply moved. Sparkling gold in the sun, these ancient symbols of the Buddha’s first teaching have adorned Tibetan monasteries for hundreds of years. Today, they welcome visitors to a sacred place in the USA where the Dharma has never flourished before.

Each one of you has made a crucial contribution to bring this about. By our combined gifts and efforts, may the Buddha Hall sustain Buddha’s teachings on love, compassion, and wisdom far into the future.

And of course, we request Rinpoche to come back as soon as possible!

New Connections

The year brought new connections that also helped to ground the Dharma in North America. A gifted young lama, Yangten Rinpoche, made his first visit to the Abbey, giving a rapid-fire teaching on Nagarjuna’s “Commentary on Bodhicitta.” An assistant to His Holiness the Dalai Lama, he also performed a blessing ceremony in the Buddha Hall.

We also welcomed Geshe Delek Wangmo from Dolma Ling Nunnery in India. Among the first Tibetan nuns to receive the geshe degree, she stayed with us for a month, teaching Tibetan-style debate—in English!—and exploring American culture. Her sharp mind and Dharma joy inspired us all.

While the Abbey practices in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition, our Vinaya lineage comes through the Chinese tradition, which has maintained full ordination of women since the 4th century C.E. The Tibetan tradition only offers novice ordination for women. We have benefited from our connection with Taiwanese nuns, and two significant exchanges with bhikshunis from Dharma Drum Mountain furthered the bond.

Vice Abbess Venerable Master Guo Goang visited for two weeks, inspiring us with her thoughtful teachings on monastic life and discipline. A few months later, 10 nuns from Dharma Drum’s Nung Chan Monastery arrived for a Dharma exchange, a mutually enriching experience of living in the Vinaya—the monastic ethical code—across cultures and countries in modern times.

A third Taiwan connection came through the full ordination of five Abbey nuns at Fo En Si Temple: Venerables Lamsel, Kunga, Dekyi, Rinchen, and Monlam. I was honored to serve as one of the 10 ordaining bhikshuni masters in the Triple Platform program, and Ven. Damcho translated for all of us.

A flood of generosity came as benefactors offered custom-made Chinese temple instruments—a large bell, drum, gong, and wooden fish—for the Buddha Hall. A similar Chinese temple bell was offered to the first Buddhist monastery in Tibet, Samye Monastery. Built in the 8th century, destroyed in the Cultural Revolution, and rebuilt in 1988, the temple and bell both exist to this day—an auspicious portent for Sravasti Abbey!

Honoring Precious Teachers

Along with rejoicing, the Abbey experienced significant losses in 2024: Our late resident teacher Geshe Dadul Namgyal; Ven. Mingjia, who helped to ordain several of our senior nuns; Professor Jeffrey Hopkins, who weekly shared his wisdom via Skype and Zoom for more than a decade; and Ven. Heng Ching, who did so much to train and encourage our bhikshuni sangha.

Each one gave selflessly of their time, talent, and genius—giving their lives—to share the Dharma. Each made inestimable contributions to the Abbey’s development. We honor them by our aspiration to follow their example.

Geshe Dadul Namgyal

Venerable Chodron offers a painting of Manjushri to Venerable Mingjia.

Venerable Mingjia Shih

Professor Jeffrey Hopkins

Ven. Hengching with Abbey nuns at Pu Yi Nunnery in 2024.

Venerable Heng Ching

Library of Wisdom and Compassion

In another ending of a more joyful nature, Wisdom Publications released the 10th and final volume in The Library of Wisdom and Compassion, Vajrayana and the Culmination of the Path, in December.

The series brings the full spectrum of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s teachings to the Western world, and the privilege of being editor and co-author (at his insistence) is indescribable. For me, this has been a labor of love spanning nearly 30 years. May His Holiness’s wise and compassionate teachings guide sincere disciples for generations to come.

So Much More

We offered more teachings, talks, and retreats than we can list here—more than 100 offsite and online! Our prison Dharma program grew to include twice monthly visits to Airway Heights Correctional Center, our local prison, by Venerables Jigme, Ngawang, and Gyatso. We revived regular, in-person Dharma classes in Spokane and Newport, while continuing our usual array of retreats and courses, online talks, and teaching series at the Abbey.

Amidst Buddha Hall construction, the community also engaged in an extensive fire mitigation effort, working in the forest and around the buildings. And our old, original well finally crumbled. We had to drill a new one a few feet away from the old one, which produces even more fresh water than we had before. To top it all off, surprise legacy gifts provided funds to seed two quasi-endowment funds that can sustain the Abbey into the future.

Your gifts provide the fuel to carry the flame of Buddha’s teachings on love, compassion, and wisdom into the world.

In particular, your offerings have built the Buddha Hall, a spiritual home for all beings, and sustained the lives of our 22 resident monastics. From the goodness of your hearts, the virtues of kindness and ethical conduct continue to grow, even in this time of global and domestic conflict, bringing forth skies of merit. Thank you for all you do to create peace in a chaotic world.

Please visit soon to join us in the Buddha Hall!

Residents rejoice that we finally got the occupancy permit for the Buddha Hall. We hope it will be ready for visitors soon!