| | The activity and projects of Thabarwa Sayadaw U Ottamasara might be of interest to you, even though his place cannot be considered a monastery because of to much involvement with lay people.
He set up a meditation center which ended up functioning as a refugee camp at the same time, taking care of poor, homeless, sick and who ever needs care.
His aim was and is to teach meditation to everybody regardless of their circumstances , thats why he does not emphasize rules but to do good deeds at his center. If there are less rules, there will be more chance for people to get involved in meditation. Self responsibility is the key, it is totally different than the normal quiet meditation center, which most people imagine when they think of meditation.
This thabarwa (burmese: natural) center are actually branches set up and rapidly expanding throughout myanmar, this year the first center opened up in malaysia.
The Main purpose is meditation but there are also unlimited possibilities for meditators and lay people to do meditation in action to contribute to the well being of others.
This kind of activity from a monk is extremely rare in myanmar, it gets a lot of support from monks who come regularly to visit and teach. almost daily different monks from many kinds of tradition come to teach at Thabarwa Center. There is also a lot of criticism for lack of Vinaya But the good deeds are more important and also the center is rapidly changing and improving with time.
It is a very new center only 8 years old, but it is a huge village with 3000 people and a lot of room for improvement.
There is a meditation schedule for yogis who strictly want to meditate.
The monks (about 200) in the center collecting a lot of food daily to support the elderly and sick living in the center is actually the only activity they collectively do but now they also set up a school for young nuns and one for novices to study the dhamma. Nuns and monks do alot of the administration, planning and organizing of thabarw projects like dhamma hospitals, schools, dhamma halls, building pagodas and new wellfare villages etc.
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