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We’ll gather together on unceded land of the Coast Miwok people to perform the Kuan Yin/Atonement ceremony outdoors for Earth Day weekend.

We will be honoring and atoning for harms to the non-human realm. Point Reyes is an especially poignant location to host our ceremony. The decades-long use of ⅓ of this public land for dairy ranches has resulted in ecosystem degradation, water pollution, biodiversity loss, and the profound suffering of the native Tule elk and other indigenous species, alongside the cows raised for dairy and veal.

The ceremony will include prayer, a shrine to the animal and Earthen world, an adaptation of the Kuan Yin/Atonement ceremony, and space for participants to offer a message of atonement for taking life and perpetuating harm. We hope you’ll join us for this opportunity to make living amends in community, witnessing and supporting each other in kindness and love for all beings.

With the stunning beauty of the land and its inhabitants for inspiration, and the knowledge of harms past, present and future as fuel for our atonement, we’ll join in ceremony and community to hold space and offer our deepest prayers, apologies, and intentions.

We'll follow our ceremony with a vegan potluck, so please bring something plant-based to share. For those who’d like to stay for the whole day, there are many beautiful hikes on the land, or you can drive to the coast to the ocean, stopping by the ranches on the way to offer additional atonement to the baby cows caged in small huts, waiting to be killed and sold as veal.

Schedule:

Gather, greet, and introduce ourselves from 11.00 - 11.30

Ceremony from 11.30-12:30

Vegan Potluck from 12:30-1:30 (please bring a plant-based dish to share)

Optional Hike from 1:30 on for those who’d like to organize

REGISTER HERE

Getting there + Earth care

If you'd like to be added to the list for arranging carpools, let Charity know (charity@jamjamjam.com) your LOCATION and CONTACT INFO and she'll connect interested people with each other to lower the carbon footprint of this event.

Note for out-of-towners

For those who can't join us in person, we invite you to feel into an area you are called to be present for, near your home. You may also consider friends or local sangha members who can join you. We can also post a notice if you want to host a ceremony. And you will receive a template and training to host your own event at our April 14 meeting (info here).

About Thanissara:

Thanissara is a long-time Dharma practitioner and teacher. She trained for 12 years in the Thai Forest monastic tradition of Ajahn Chah, has led meditation retreats internationally for the last 30 years and has an MA in Mindfulness-Based Psychotherapy Practice. With her partner, Kittisaro co-founded Dharmagiri Sacred Mountain Retreat Centre in South Africa, and the Non-Profit Sacred Mountain Sangha in the US. She is author of Time To Stand Up, An Engaged Buddhist Manifesto for Our Earth and a member of the Spirit Rock Teacher Council. For more info, visit www.sacredmountainsangha.org.

About Charity Kahn:

Charity Kahn is a musician, teaching artist, Certified Mindfulness Meditation Instructor, and Certified Qigong Instructor based in San Francisco, CA. She has released seven albums of award-winning music for families and a collection of guided meditations for kids with her band Charity and the JAMband. She is the founder of The JAM Experience, sharing music, movement and mindfulness with families around the Bay Area and beyond through her beloved classes, camps and concerts since 2001. Charity also combines mindfulness and a passion for social and environmental justice in concerts and recordings for grown-ups with her band The Invisible Bee, and through her Vegan Journey and PAEAN courses and events. For more info, visit www.charitykahn and www.jamjamjam.com.

LEARN MORE + REGISTER HERE

Hosted by Charity and Thanissara for PAEAN’s Vegan Journey Sangha

All Welcome!

We had a wonderful gathering of hearts and minds at our last PAEAN Vegan Journey event, “Waking Up to Speciesism, Together”. We reflected on the ways in which othering of non-human animals and plants shows up in our lives, habits, and choices, and how our dharma practices of compassion and wisdom support us in seeing and ending the harms we cause. We had a range of people in attendance, from those who have hunted to long-time vegans, all of us on a journey of inquiry and curiosity with this topic.

The desire to atone and make amends for harms we’ve caused our animal and Earthen relatives was palpable, so we are moved to offer a simple ceremony to honor these feelings and all the beings. This will mark the beginning of a new Vegan Journey Sangha, meeting every 6-8 weeks, with the topic for each meeting rising organically based on the group’s wishes.

Our upcoming ceremony will include prayer, a shrine to the animal and Earthen world, a simple chant, and space for participants to offer a message of atonement for taking life and perpetuating harm. We hope you’ll join us for this opportunity to make living amends in community, witnessing and supporting each other in kindness and love for all beings.

Please bring:

A photo or piece of artwork or physical object to add to the shrine (we request you send a jpg or png ahead of time so we can put them together, email to charity@jamjamjam.com) You can also make your offering to your own shrine, or after the ceremony to a special place in nature.

Something to share (could be a poem, song, prose) to offer atonement

Hosts: Charity Kahn and Thanissara

Fee: Donation

Location: Zoom

REGISTER HERE

DATES: Five Wednesdays, February 1 - March 1, 5-6pm PST

Join us to read and discuss in community the groundbreaking book by George Monbiot, "Regenesis: Feeding the World Without Devouring the Planet"

The title says it all. The time is now to reimagine our food systems, and our entire relationship with the living world.

We'll gather together weekly to discuss the book and its implications, and our inspirations, challenges and intentions.

Hosts: Charity Kahn and Thanissara

Fee: Donation

Location: Zoom

REGISTER HERE

Dates: Saturday Jan 28 - Saturday Feb 11

Have you considered transitioning to a plant-based diet for health, environmental, or ethical reasons? Are you curious about what eating more plants and less meat+dairy would look like for you and your family? Do you have questions about how and why you might make these changes? Are you already eating plant-based but would like more community, education and support? Are you inspired, or resistant, or somewhere in the middle? Then this loving, fun and yummy no-judgement 15-day exploration in community is for you!

The course includes:

• Three Saturday Zoom meetings in community (Jan 28, Feb 4, Feb 11, 9-10:30am PST)

• Daily email support (tips, tricks, recipes, inspiration, inquiry)

• WhatsApp group for community engagement

• 45-minute 1:1 coaching session with Charity for extra support

Instructor: Charity Kahn

Fee: Sliding Scale

Location: Zoom

LEARN MORE + REGISTER HERE

Let’s meet in community to unpack the belief systems of Speciesism and Carnism, and explore how the internalization of these systems informs and drives our societal and individual choices and behaviors. We’ll watch a short TEDx talk with Melanie Joy entitled “Toward Rational, Authentic Food Choices”, followed by journaling, inquiry and a guided community discussion.

“Awareness has always been the antidote to violent ideologies.” ~ Melanie Joy

Hosts: Charity Kahn and Thanissara

Fee: Donation

Location: Zoom

REGISTER HERE

Hosts: Thanissara and Charity Kahn

Location: Zoom [EVENT IS FREE BUT REGISTERATION IS REQUIRED. VISIT HERE TO REGISTER VIA EVENTBRITE]

Gather with us to view in community this radical film which reveals the truths about the meat and dairy industry as it relates to human health, ethics, and the very future of the planet. We’ll follow the viewing with journaling, discussion, a guided meditation, and tools for responding to what comes up.

Summary of the film: "’Cowspiracy: The Sustainability Secret’ is a groundbreaking feature-length environmental documentary following intrepid filmmaker Kip Andersen as he uncovers the most destructive industry facing the planet today – and investigates why the world’s leading environmental organizations are too afraid to talk about it."

Links:

Cowspiracy’s web site

More about the film

Summary of facts from the film

Location: Zoom [EVENT IS FREE BUT REGISTERATION IS REQUIRED. VISIT HERE TO REGISTER VIA EVENTBRITE]

Registration: Sign up here

Gather with us to view in community this inspiring and thought-provoking conversation between two vegan Dharma teachers. We’ll follow the viewing with journaling, discussion, a compassion meditation, and tools for responding to what comes up.

Summary of the talk: "The medicine our world most needs is compassion, and it is crucial that this includes all living beings. Our societal conditioning blinds us to the horror of suffering experienced by non-human animals through our cruel system of factory farming. This conversation looks at how facing and responding to this suffering is necessary for the freedom of our own hearts, and the healing of the world."

Preview the talk on YouTube, Tara’s web site, or your favorite podcast app