»2008 Retreat Schedule
The Founding of Bodhi Tree Forest Monastery
 Bodhi Tree Forest Monastery was founded by Ven. Pannyavaro (Thera) an Australian monk of over 20 years service in 2005.
Ordained in the Thai tradition, he spent many years studying and practicing in Burma and Sri Lanka. He is better known as the founder and webmaster of BuddhaNet.net.
Pannyavaro plans to develop a meditation community to serve both lay and monastic practitioners on ninety-five acres of beautiful land at Tullera five minutes from Lismore in the Northern Rivers of New South Wales, Australia. This land has been purchased as a sanctuary and hermitage - known as Bodhi Tree Forest Monastery and Retreat centre. Site works and development are being planned.
Supportive Conditions
Supportive conditions for ordained and lay practitioners to undertake long term intensive meditation practice are hard to find in western countries. To assist people to penetrate the heart of the Buddha's teaching The Buddha Dharma Education Association is planning three 'hermitage' areas in addition to a large meditation hall and group accommodation area at Bodhi Tree.
The Land
The land forms and tree cover at Bodhi Tree naturally divide the land making it easy for different activities to coexist here. From two streams with beautiful rock pools the land rises to a large flat plateau. There is a good balance of cleared and forested land with many impressive old trees, the creek valleys have plenty of flat and gently sloping areas. The plateau of 15 acres of rich red soil has expansive and uplifting views and is a natural choice for the Retreat Centre.
Hermitages
To support Monks and Nuns and Lay Yogis we are developing three separated Hermitage areas, along a lightly wooded valley with a stream and on the plateau.
Small Kutis or meditation huts will house individual meditators. Each hut will have a sheltered walking meditation place.
Retreat Centre
The Bodhi Tree Retreat Centre is for holding weekend, 10-day and longer teaching retreats for the local, national and international community. There is a great need for these facilities in Australia. We attract many visitors from Brisbane, a large city 2½ hours north, to our weekend programs. Australia is a vast country and there are no Theravada meditation centres north of Sydney.
Buddhanet.net
BuddhaNet.Net now has a home base at Bodhi Tree Monastery. Ven Pannyavaro pioneered a Buddhist presence on the Internet as webmaster of BuddhaNet.net since 1992.
Pannyavaro Thera's faith in the need for a quality presence on the web was correct. The unique users of BuddhaNet are about 50,000 to 100,000 worldwide, who use the multitude of print and multimedia resources on the non-sectarian BuddhaNet site every day.
There are several hundred eBooks and essays to down load free of charge as well as an enormous resource for teaching Buddhism in Schools.
We are currently upgrading sections of BuddhaNet to make it a searchable database. This is the first stage of expanding the site to include the World Buddhist Directory database and eLibrary.
We plan a BuddhaNet Multimedia centre and library on the land to facilitate the work of developing educational resources and transferring print, audio and multimedia resources into digital formats for the World Buddhist eLibrary
Buddha Dharma Education Association Inc.
The Buddha Dharma Education Association (BDEA Inc.) was established in 1992 by Ven. Pannyavaro Thera. Ordained in Thailand over 20 years ago he is also a teacher in the Burmese 'Mahasi Sayadaw' Vipassana Tradition and is a Vice-president of the World Fellowship of Buddhists and the Buddhist Federation of Australia. He teaches in Australia, Thailand, Malaysia and Singapore.
BDEA Inc. is an incorporated community association under Australian Law responsible for Buddhanet.net and the Bodhi Tree Forest Monastery.
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Supporting The Four Fold Community
The Buddha taught that the four fold community of Monks and Nuns, Lay women and Lay men needed to be strong and healthy for the Teachings to flourish.
Mindful of this, we wish to support the meditation practice needs of all four groups.
Just as a Bodhi Tree gives shade to whoever sits under it the Bodhi Tree Monastery is non-sectarian. Whoever wishes to train and practice in the Insight Traditions of Theravada Buddhism is welcome. This includes ordained and lay Sangha of other Buddhist traditions as well as people of different religious traditions.
The Ordained Sangha in Australia
A place for Monks and Nuns returning from training in Asia. Western monks and nuns often struggle to continue their vocation and training without the supports of food, shelter and community available in Asia.
Asian monastics in Australia are often very busy attending to the cultural and pastoral needs of the communities they serve. Our facilities can help those Venerables who wish for an intensive meditation retreat, a respite from their demanding pastoral work.
The Lay Community
- The Retreat Centre meets the need for introductory teaching retreats & group retreats from two days to a few weeks long.
- The Lay Hermitage is for Lay Yogis to undertake longer periods of intensive practice (several weeks or months) away from the usual responsibilities of lay life, but close to Teachers.
Lay Teachers
Lay teachers, both women and men have played a big role in the development of Buddhism in the west. Bodhi Tree Monastery wishes to support these teachers and will make our facilities available to them.
Service
Atthacariya or beneficial action for the common good is one of the Buddha's four teaching on the foundations of community (Sangha Vatthu).
The Buddha Dharma Education Association is setting up Trusts under Australian Law to promote and support initiatives in the areas of aid work, social justice, environmental repair and peace at a local, national and international level. A working centre for Ordained and Lay Sangha will continue, and enhance the ancient pattern of the natural flow of Insight into Action and Service in community (atthacariya). help us build and grow Fulfilling the vision of The Bodhi Tree is a big undertaking.
We ask you, as a member of the larger National and International Buddhist community for your financial help.
- A meditation hut costs AUD$7,500
- The BuddhaNet Multimedia Facility will cost AUD$180,000
- The large Meditation Hall will cost AUD$150,000
- The Retreat Centre sleeping rooms for men and women will cost AUD$ 100,000 each
- Roads and drainage will cost AUD$50,000
There are Several Ways to Donate
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Use the secure on line credit card facility at:
www.buddhanet.net/dana/donation_form.htm
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You can send cheques or money orders made out to ‘Buddha Dharma Education Association’
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 Australian residents can make a gift that is fully tax deductible under Australian Taxation Law. Make these donations to 'BDEA School Building Trust Fund'. This Trust fund is only for building and site development works. An official receipt for tax purposes will be issued to you.
Click Here to make an online Donation or download a Bodhi Tree Brochure which includes a donation form:
 Bodhi Tree - Pledge Form PDF Doc. (306kb)
To download: right click on link and choose 'save target as...'
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