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WCF Questionnaire - Retreats

Caricature of man scratching head in puzzlement

A questionnaire to help us plan future retreat programmes to suit you.

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2024 , WCF News

Introduction to Meditation, Buddhism and Chan (online)

Bodhidharma, by Unkei Ikkei, 1504-1520, ink on paper detail, Linden Museum

Western Chan Fellowship is rerunning the free online course, ‘Introduction to Meditation, Buddhism and Chan’. This consists of four weekly online 90-minute sessions led by two experienced Western Chan Fellowship group leaders, David Valentine-Hagart and Guy Roberts. It is geared towards newcomers to the WCF, but those already engaged with the WCF and interested in finding out more about the…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2024 , WCF News

Violence in Myanmar

Calligraphy for the character Chan

The European Buddhist Union (EBU) has issued a statement condemning the recent and ongoing violence in Myanmar. The Western Chan Fellowship CIO is a member of EBU and joins in that statement and commends it to our readers.

A large group of Buddhist teachers in USA have issued a similar statement and are encouraging support for…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2017 , WCF News

Western Chan Fellowship Organisational Changes

Calligraphy for the character Chan

From 1st July 2017 Western Chan Fellowship, registered charity 1068637, is winding down its operations and passing its activities and assets to a new charity with a similar name and objects, Western Chan Fellowship CIO, registered charity number 1166162. If you have an outstanding retreat booking with Western Chan Fellowship then it has been transferred automatically to Western Chan Fellowship…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2017 , WCF News

Early Buddhism and the Four Great Vows, Stephen Batchelor

Stephen Batchelor presenting

Now available for viewing on the WCF YouTube channel

Click the red YouTube button to subscribe

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2017 , WCF News

WCF Organisational Changes

Calligraphy for the character Chan

On 28th January 2017 at an EGM of the Western Chan Fellowship the members present voted unanimously to transfer the assets and activities of Western Chan Fellowship (registered charity no. 1068637) to ‘Western Chan Fellowship Charitable Incorporated Organisation’ (registered charity no. 1166162).

‘Western Chan Fellowship CIO’ as it will be known (‘WCF CIO’ in this message’), will operate in very…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2017 , WCF News

Calendar December 2016

2016 Calendar image: December

It was a fine winter’s day and I was on a work trip, travelling from the Ogmore Valley over the tops of the hills and down towards the Rhondda Valley. As I came over the top, there on the side of the road, by a small parking space, were some flowers left in shrine-like arrangement. They overlooked the village of Cwmparc. I stopped my car and got out. The wind was keen and cold. I thought the…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar November 2016

2016 Calendar image: November

I had walked from Trehebert to Treorchy on a grey wet day. As I went over a railway bridge I saw a discarded loaf of sliced bread lying in the gutter, it's open and the slices are lying there soaking up the dirty water from the rain. You can just make it out, in the middle, toward the bottom of the image. I become interested in the discarded food and the people walking past it and I take some…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar October 2016

2016 Calendar image: October

We were visiting Hong Kong and we went to the Po Lin Monastery on Lantau island. The monastery sits on a hill overlooking the island. There is a Buddha on top of the hill known as Tian Tan Buddha, whose hands are in the Abhaya Mudra, which symbolises protection, peace and the dispelling of fears. The Buddha is 113 feet tall and we climbed the 286 steps to reach the base around which there are…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar September 2016

2016 Calendar image: September

At the beach watching two people playfully chasing each other in the sea. They are lost in their playfulness, oblivious to all around them, happily splashing each other. In taking the photograph, the nature of the exposure results in one person appearing as if a shadow. A shadow cannot leave the object that casts it and that object cannot lose its shadow. When the sun shines, there are always…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar August 2016

2016 Calendar image: August

So here we are at Barry Island, a favourite place for people to go for a walk. Like most when I set out for this beach, I have no idea whether the tide will be in or out. Barry is one of those places with a very high tidal range, so when ‘in’, the sea is often squashing the beach up to the promenade wall and when it is ‘out’, it is several hundred yards away, almost stretching across to the other…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar July 2016

2016 Calendar image: July

On one of our many visits to Pembrokeshire, we found that the Welsh Triathlon Championships was to begin and start at Broadhaven. I undoubtedly had a number of preconceptions about the competitors of this swimming, cycling, running race in that I was expecting a group of muscular, athletic, fit-looking young men ready to race against each other. I was surprised to discover men and women of all…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Rebecca Li receives Dharma Transmission

Rebecca Li receiving the transmission robe from Simon Child

We are pleased to announce that WCF Guiding Teacher Simon Child, Jing-hong Chuan-fa, has appointed his second Dharma Heir.

Rebecca Li, of New Jersey USA, was a regular practitioner with Chan Master Sheng Yen from the late 1990s until Master Sheng Yen’s passing in 2009, as well as acting as his translator on many occasions and also as a member of the Board of Dharma Drum Retreat Center. She has…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar June 2016

2016 Calendar image: June

A visit to Barcelona. We had been to see the Miro Museum; we stood in awe at the unfinished church by Antoni Gaudi - La Sagrada Familia - and we had walked along Las Ramblas looking at the items being sold to tourists. We were now tired and wished to sit down with a cup of coffee. In a side street, we found a cafe with tables outside and as it was a hot day, we choose to sit in the shade. A woman…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

Calendar May 2016

2016 Calendar image: May

I was walking along Porth High Street and I noticed two photographs advertising a woman's hairdressing shop. I wanted to photograph these photographs. As I got ready to take my picture a woman walked past and her blonde hair mirrored the images in the shop window so I included her in the frame. Then just as I pressed my shutter release the woman turned and looked at me and her young child looked…

Western Chan Fellowship CIO

Categories: 2016 , WCF News

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