Retreat Cabin Application
Open Dates
Great Vow Zen Monastery
The monastery retreat cabin rests on the edge of our 23 acres of forest. Though, just a short walk to the monastery buildings, it has a feeling of a forest hermitage. Equipped with running water, electricity, a small kitchenette with electric stovetop and small refrigerator and a compost toilet it is an ideal location for doing short solo retreat practice. You will have access to our forest trail system, beautiful meadows and gardens, as well as the privacy for solo meditation and dharma study. The intention of the retreat hut is to provide practice support for those looking to deepen…
ZCO Board meeting September 2024
September 8, 2024
Heart of Wisdom (in person) and Online (Zoom)
Board meetings are open and members of the community are invited to attend. Board meetings are a place to find out what’s happening and how ZCO functions. Typical topics include finances, reports on goings on at the monastery and temple, committee reports, and the community's strategic plans. Meetings are held via Zoom.
Jizo Sesshin
With Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi and Laura Jomon Martin
September 10 - 15, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery - In Person Only
This retreat begins on Tuesday! This retreat will focus on the qualities of Jizo Bodhisattva, guardian of all that comes from the earth, and Jizo’s qualities – benevolence, optimism, fearlessness, determination, and vow. A unique element of this retreat is the inclusion of time devoted to art projects, creative time, and a slide show and talk about Jizo. As part of our practice, we will be making small Jizo-related items. Due to the nature of this retreat schedule, we will be sitting outside and also out of the zendo to make art, there will not be an online option.…
Investigating Zen Practice: a one-day workshop
With Darah Shonin Ashton and Ed Gensho Welsh
September 14, 2024
Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple
Experience an Introduction to Zen Practice through the Ten Directions. This one-day in-person workshop at Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple is for beginners or those who want to dive deeper into Zen practice. Learn how to practice using ancient methods that are applicable in today’s world: Meditation and sitting with stability Mindfulness practice off the cushion Chanting Mindful eating Work practice Stillness Walking meditation Koans Tradition and ritual Dharma teachings Lunch is included. Your RSVP helps us know how much lunch to prepare.
Oceans of Compassion: A Retreat In Service To The Earth
With Kodo Conover and Laura Jomon Martin
September 19 - 22, 2024
Offsite: Beverly Beach State Park
In conjunction with SOLVE’s Oregon Beach Cleanup activities, you’re invited to join the Zen Community of Oregon for a weekend CAMPING/MEDITATION retreat at BEVERLY BEACH STATE PARK. Take a weekend on the coast to connect with the Sangha. With a relaxed schedule and opportunity for socializing, there will be sitting times, Dharma talks, and practices to take with you into the clean-up.
Jizo Ceremony for Children Who Have Died
With Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi
September 21, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery
The loss of a child often opens a well of profound grief. No matter how the child dies, suddenly or slowly, whether through illness, accident, miscarriage, abortion, or suicide, our sorrow is deep and may be long-lasting.
2nd Wilderness Backpacking Sesshin: a weeklong meditation retreat
With Danney Soten Lynch and Sara Shinei Monial
September 22 - 29, 2024
Mt. Hood Wilderness (Wy'east)
This retreat will be held in the Mt. Hood Wilderness, Oregon. Previous meditation retreat and backpacking experience is highly recommended. Immerse yourself in the silent wisdom of the forest, mountains, and sky. Allow these wild places to awaken within you and inform how you experience and embody this life.
Annual Dinner
September 28, 2024
Saint Andrew Catholic Church
Once a year we gather for a dinner celebration to reflect on what we've accomplished and intentions for the year ahead.
Home Hermitage – A Day Long Retreat Online
With Jogen Salzberg, Sensei
September 29, 2024
Online
We will spend a day meditating in the intimate aloneness that embraces all beings. Doing sustained zazen in our own dwelling place and its wild domesticity invites the desired integration of the everyday and the sacred. […]
16 Bodhisattva Precepts Classes – Online
With Amy Kisei, Sensei
October 6 - November 10, 2024
Online
The beginning and end of our practice is ethical living; acting, speaking and thinking in ways that support the greatest wellbeing and awakening for all beings. Everyone is welcome to attend these classes, whether you have already formally taken the precepts, are considering taking the precepts, or you are simply curious about the ethical guidelines that rest at the foundation of Zen practice.
Five Buddhist Precepts for Ethical Living: Online Class Series
With Laura Jomon Martin
October 8 - November 12, 2024
Online
These one hour online 5 Precepts classes will happen every Wednesday for six weeks. We all want to live a compassionate life. The precepts give us a framework for what it means to live an ethical life. More then a set of rules to follow, the precepts are deep inquiries into the actual living of our lives with attention and love. The format is an introductory talk followed by class discussion. Participants will be encouraged to do a short writing on each precept and practice with the precept during the week. There are also some supplemental readings.
Autumn Ango – Fall Residency
With Hogen and Chozen Roshi
October 8 - December 15, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery
This Dharma is abundantly present in each human being, but if we do not practice it, it does not manifest itself, and if we do not experience it, it cannot be realized. - Dogen Zenji In communion with our ancestors who set aside time each year for deep retreat, the Monastery offers this Autumn Ango. Ango is a celebration of stillness and quiet contemplation, upheld with the support of community and teachers. Ango can be translated to mean peaceful dwelling. During this practice period our daily schedule takes on a tone of a light retreat which includes more zazen (about…
October Sesshin – The Ancient Way
With Hogen Bays, Roshi, Patrick Bansho Green and Darah Shonin Ashton
October 10 - 20, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
There is something very special about the magic of autumn and the kicking off of the fall ango practice period that makes this sesshin so powerful. What a great gift it is to be able to sit together in silence. This is our longest sesshin of the year. The extra days enable us drop down into the bare bones essentials of our lives. We have this rare opportunity to turn towards the practice/awakening that is our true nature, and to celebrate quietly together in the container of sesshin. Day after day plunge into the waters of mystery and exploration. Turn…
Five Buddhist Precepts for Ethical Living – in person
With Kodo Conover
October 25 - November 29, 2024
Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple
These one hour online 5 Precepts classes will happen every Wednesday for six weeks. We all want to live a compassionate life. The precepts give us a framework for what it means to live an ethical life. More then a set of rules to follow, the precepts are deep inquiries into the actual living of our lives with attention and love. The format is an introductory talk followed by class discussion. Participants will be encouraged to do a short writing on each precept and practice with the precept during the week. There are also some supplemental readings.
Autumn Zazenkai: A One Day Meditation Retreat
With Ed Gensho Welsh
October 26, 2024
Heart of Wisdom Zen Temple
A Zazenkai is a day of Zen practice in the city. Join us for a silent day of meditation (seated and walking), chanting, mindful eating, temple care-taking, and a dharma talk. We close the day with a ceremony to renewing our intention to live an ethical life.
Loving Kindness Weekend Meditation Retreat
November 1 - 3, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery
With wonderment on our side, and in relationship with all that is, we recognize the inherent compassion that springs forth from deep and sustained presence. Held in a container of zen forms and the soft silence of a monastery nestling into winter, we will explore the nature of being anything at all! This exploration will take place within the practices of zazen, chanting, formal meals and work practice Much of the day will be spent in the meditation hall practicing seated meditation together. Beginners welcome. 🙂
November Sesshin – Gratitude
With Patrick Bansho Green and Sara Shinei Monial
November 11 - 17, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery
With gratitude for our beloved sangha near and far, the Monastery joyfully offers another sesshin. This sesshin has no set price. All are welcome to attend, and donations from the heart are welcome. During this week of practice, we will eat only the offerings brought to us specifically for this retreat. So food donations, while always welcome, are particularly helpful! Bring food that you like to eat, bring food that will challenge our kitchen team and cook. The head cook (tenzo) will need to dive into creativity and allow the surprises of each donation manifest our meals. We will…
ZCO Board meeting November 2024
November 24, 2024
Heart of Wisdom (in person) and Online (Zoom)
Board meetings are open and members of the community are invited to attend. Board meetings are a place to find out what’s happening and how ZCO functions. Typical topics include finances, reports on goings on at the monastery and temple, committee reports, and the community's strategic plans. Meetings are held via Zoom.
December Sesshin – Rohatsu
With Jan Chozen Bays, Roshi, Hogen Bays, Roshi and Larry Fuho Trussell
December 1 - 8, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
The light of the Buddha's awakening has not dimmed. This very moment, alive, awake and luminous. Each year people from all over the world gather to celebrate, to sit in stillness and to be nourished by this truth. All over the world people join in the ritual of Rohatsu sesshin. This sesshin is the culmination of a year of practice and is also the culmination of our fall Ango practice period. At many centers and monasteries, this is the most valued sesshin of the year, and may be the only one that many people are able to attend. We…
Beginner’s Mind Weekend Meditation Retreat
With Laura Jomon Martin and Myoyu Haley Voekel
December 13 - 15, 2024
Great Vow Zen Monastery
The teachings and practices of Zen Buddhism empower us to live our lives wholeheartedly with openness, insight and compassion. During this weekend retreat we follow a silent retreat schedule, which allows us to temporarily put aside outside concerns and go deeply into inner work. The silent retreat schedule includes about seven hours of sitting meditation (with breaks), Buddhist chanting services, formal oriyoki meals, and a period of community work practice. On the first evening the retreat leaders will give thorough instruction on the foundations and methods of Zen meditation. Opportunities to meet with a teacher or senior practitioner to discuss…
Vow Sesshin
With Hogen Bays, Roshi, Sara Shinei Monial and Patrick Bansho Green
January 7 - 12, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery
From emptiness springs forth our deepest potential. When we are able to drop our ideas about who and what we are, we can recognize the infinite realm of possibility that has always been our playground. Reality before interpretation, before we start applying labels and identities, is vast and unbounded. From this space, we access the wisdom and compassion that is the source material of our life. With wisdom and compassion as our foundation, we recognize that we are the totality. Nothing separate and always in relationship. We come to see our personality and our personal particularities as part of the…
Pari-Nirvana Sesshin: A Meditation Retreat exploring Life, Death & the Unknown
With Amy Kisei, Sensei and Laura Jomon Martin
February 3 - 9, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
Zen meditation is an invitation to the unknown. During this sesshin we take up the Buddha's Parinirvana--the Buddha's death, as the essential inquiry into our own relationship with death, dying and the uncertainties of this life. How often in your daily life do you allow yourself to reflect on your own mortality, your own death? This sesshin provides the structure and support needed to look into the fears and anxieties surrounding death, dying and the unknown. Supported by the stillness and quiet of winter, we allow the body, heart and mind to deeply settle and rest - as we feel…
March Sesshin – Deep Listening
With Jogen Salzberg, Sensei, Hogen Bays, Roshi and Anusha Enryu Fernando
March 14 - 23, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
Awareness meeting sound has been a gate into the depths of the heart-mind for as long as human beings hve longed to open. During this sesshin we come together in joyous recognition of the power of deep listening, and sink into the rhythms of our wild, wonderful and mysterious life.
May Sesshin – The Light of our Ancestors
With Amy Kisei, Sensei, Patrick Bansho Green and Ed Gensho Welsh
May 12 - 18, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
Zen is a direct Mind to Mind transmission--a transmission of light. We study with teachers who help us recognize and embody our awakened wisdom and compassion. During this sesshin, we will connect with our roots and draw strength from the stories of those who have come before us. Our ancestors are real people, walking the path of their lives and opening the Dharma truths - just as we aspire to do. Join us for this intimate week of practice. Sesshin is a rigorous and, at times, challenging silent meditation retreat that is not recommended for beginners. In order to attend…
June Sesshin – Loving Kindness
With Jogen Salzberg, Sensei and Laura Jomon Martin
June 9 - 15, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery or Online
Our Original Heart is always open. Loving Kindness practice can help dispel the fear and anxiety that prevents us from experiencing the ease and joy of the present moment. This is not a complacent practice, but a call to honest intimacy with ourselves and the world in which we live. Join us for this meditation retreat where we immerse ourselves in the teachings and practices of Loving Kindness. Sesshin is a rigorous and, at times, challenging silent meditation retreat that is not recommended for beginners. In order to attend in person, we ask that you attend one of our silent…
July Sesshin – Summer Breeze
With Patrick Bansho Green, Danney Soten Lynch and Darah Shonin Ashton
July 21 - 27, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery
Summer is bright and alive. The sun hangs high in the sky, illuminating the earth with unflinching clarity. What wisdom does a warm summer day offer? Everything is laid bare before the luminous rays of the sun. In this meditation immersion, we will endeavor to study the self, forget the self and glimpse Buddha Nature, opening in silent communion with this community of human and non- human beings. This is our collective awakening.
Grasses, Trees, and the Great Earth Sesshin
With Amy Kisei, Sensei, Sara Shinei Monial and Myoyu Haley Voekel
August 11 - 17, 2025
Great Vow Zen Monastery
Earth body, sky heart. Rooted and flowing. Luminous and open. We are made of earth and sky, of wind breath and rain song, our lives woven from the teachings of the natural world. This retreat is an opportunity to re-connect and relax into the wild, ancient, wisdom of the Grasses, Trees and Great Earth. We will spend time learning from each of the five elements, as they manifest in our experience. Deeply exploring and releasing into our interconnection with the living, breathing body of the Earth, waters, energizing air, bright fiery sun, and vast spacious sky. This retreat is held…