A Happy New Year.

We’ve just
spent a very peaceful and meditative evening leading up to the stroke
of midnight when we saw the New Year in chanting the Parittas as those
present each lit a stick of incense to symbolise letting go of the old
and determining to do better in the future.

We had our usual Monday evening sitting with a little talk from me
that focussed on letting go, not just of the past but the future as
well. Just as the revolving wheel hits the ground always at one place
only, so really our lives are lived just in the present even if our
minds don’t usually acknowledge that. Afterwards we had tea and were
joined by the little group who are in retreat at Bhavana Dhamma. I read
to them a few passages about some of the great forest monks of the
past, passages that focussed particularly on overcoming fear. The last
few words I read were one monk’s appraisal of what threatened Thailand
at the time. Instead of mentioning insurgency as everyone present
expected he pointed to kilesa, defilement, greed and anger and all the
rest, as the greatest threat. And so it is. It’s the enemy within that
we ought to be most careful of. My hope for the New Year is that more
of us may make a better job of facing that enemy.

Earlier in the day we had a visit from Karen who has not long
returned from Burma, where she saw something of the terrible events
that gripped that sad and beautiful land a few weeks ago. She described
arriving somewhere soon after a monk had been tied to a lamppost and
beaten to death. What can you say! Arrests and brutality are common and
the people live in fear. What can you say, what can you do but
determine to hold fast to what is good.

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