By Jack Ramsdell
History and Origins
Originally founded in 2007 as the Oklahoma Buddhist Center in Del City, the group relocated to the southside of Oklahoma City in 2009 and finally to the city’s northside in 2014. With this final move, the group’s name also changed to the Oklahoma Buddhist Vihāra (OKBV) as it is known today, and currently operates out of a property donated to the group. The facility spans a modest 2080 sq. ft. and was worth $135,000 at the time of donation. Here the monks reside together and teach classes and lead chants out of their living space.
The Abbot and founder of the Vihāra, Bhante Piyaratana (also known as Bhante Ratana), instructs three other monks who together lead meditations and services. Bhante Ratana was born in Sri Lanka and first became a monk at the age of 11, in 1989. According to the OKBV website, he studied under Malagamma Chandajothi Maha Thero at Sri Bodhirajaramaya in Kandy, Sri Lanka. He first arrived in the U.S. in 2006 serving as the resident monk for the Buddhist Meditation Center in Mankato, MN. He was given the opportunity to bring his teachings to other states and began the center in Oklahoma one year later. Bhante Ratana is highly educated, holding a master’s degree in Pāli and Buddhist Philosophy from the University of Kalaniya in Sri Lanka as well as a Ph.D. in Sanskrit from the Oklahoma City University. He has served as a monk for over 25 years and teaches also at the Oklahoma City Veterans Administration Medical Center as a Chaplain, and volunteers at local hospitals.
Bhante Ratana in 2015 (Photo Credit: OKBV website)
The OKBV’s three resident monks have varied backgrounds: Bhante Piyananda was born in Hawaii and exposed to Japanese Zen Buddhism early in life, and Bhante Rahula hails from Sri Lanka and came overseas specifically to teach at the Kansas Meditation Center in Wichita. Lastly, Bhante Santhapiya is a Buddhist convert born in New Hampshire and underwent five years of discernment before being accepted as a novice monk under Bhante Ratana in 2013, along with Bhante Piyananada. Bhante Ratana and several of the other monks at OKBV also operate the Kansas Meditation Center in Wichita. This other center lies 150 miles north of the OKBV, allowing for the monastics to regularly commute between the locations.
Left: Bhante Santhapiya, Middle: Bhante Ratana, Right: Bhante Piyananda (Photo Credit: Paul B. Southerland, The Oklahoman, 2013)
Mission
The OKBV lists the following message as their mission statement on their website:
“Oklahoma Buddhist Vihāra exists to provide a space for the monastic and lay communities to study and practice the Buddhist way of life and tenet and to share the practices of mental development with the community.”
The phrasing of this statement demonstrates the Vihāra’s openness to both serious and casual pupils in the community. The external community engagements of Bhante Ratana and the other monks demonstrates their commitment to this mission, where they offer meditation classes in various community forums and locations even including other religious organizations; in the past, they taught meditation and mindfulness classes at St. Stephen’s United Methodist Church in Norman, OK.
Practice
The OKBV engages in Theravada practice descending from Sri Lanka aimed at both monastics and lay people in the Oklahoma City area. They express openness to people of all faiths and offer teachings as in-depth into topics as people demonstrate interest in learning. The Center’s weekly programming includes guided meditation sessions that occur virtually during the pandemic on Sunday nights and last 30 minutes followed by 30-minute discussions. On Sunday mornings, Children’s Dhamma School meets virtually and allows kids an opportunity to engage in Buddha’s teachings from home. Evening meditations on Tuesdays and Thursdays occur in person at the Vihāra as of December 2021, and completely silent meditation on Wednesday evenings. On Saturday evenings, the OKBV hosts in-person chanting sessions of Buddha’s teachings in their original Pāli language. All of these sessions offered at the center are free of charge, though they encourage donations. The donation goal for December 2021 was set at $2,000, and they accept contributions over Facebook or directly through their website. For some lessons they suggest donations of a certain amount, for example a three-session course on the Four Brahma Vihara offered in October 2021 had a suggested donation of $75 for attendees. They update their Facebook page, which has nearly 1300 likes, on a regular basis and share many photos of recent events and ceremonies, allowing significant accessibility for members in the community.
As reported in a 2013 article by The Oklahoman news website, the center attracted between 50-75 people from traditionally Buddhist backgrounds as well as those from other faith disciplines for their meditation sessions. As one might expect, the chanting services at the OKBV attract a group of mostly Sri Lankan, Vietnamese, Thai, Japanese and Cambodian attendees, where Theravada stands as the dominant form of Buddhism in much of southeast Asia.
While the monks themselves take up no formal vows [?], they attempt to separate themselves from material objects and attachments to things outside of the Dharma. Following in the tradition of Theravada monastics, the OKBV observes Vas Aradhana rain retreats between July and August. To support their monks, members of the congregation offer them Pirikara donations including money, food, and atapirikara packages and learn about meditation practices. Additionally, the OKBV maintains a Dāna list throughout the year, where every week different families or groups sign-up to donate essential goods and food items to the monks. At the end of the Vas Aradhana retreat, the Vihāra celebrates Kathina. During the Kathina celebration, they have a Robe Offering ceremony, where donated robes are dyed red and offered to the monks. Vesak, the remembrance of the life of the Buddha, represents another important celebration at the OKBV. In late May, the OKBV holds a ceremony to honor his passing through spreading the Dharma and expressing gratitude to the Buddha.
Kathina 2021 Robe Offering ceremony (Photo Credit: OKBV Facebook Page)
Commemoration of Vesak 2021 (Photo Credit: OKBV website)
Comparison with Local Temples
Theravada vihāra monastic communities first appeared in the US in 1965 in Washington D.C. Thus, the Theravada tradition has been practiced for a much shorter period of time in the U.S. than Zen and other forms of East Asian Buddhism. It is also not surprising then that Theravada practices did not spread into the Great Plains region until the late 20th and 21st centuries. For these reasons, the OKBV community is comparatively new in the area when compared to other temples which were founded in the 1980s.
Oklahoma City is home to less than one dozen Buddhist communities, including both convert and immigrant temples alike. One notable group is the Buddha Mind Monastery in the southeastern part of the city, which practices Zen traditions under the leadership of the Venerable Wei Chueh, a Zen master from Taiwan. A Vietnamese temple as well as the Vietnamese Buddhist Association of OK are also located in the south part of the city.
Another popular temple in Oklahoma City is the Wat Sangharattanaram Buddhist Temple of Oklahoma. This temple targets a mostly Thai population and, like the Buddha Mind Monastery, was founded in the mid-1980s. This temple owns a significant number of properties from sheds to residences around the main building composing what is essentially a small-scale monastic complex. Following Thai traditions, the temple practices Theravada Buddhism like the OKBV, though it is located 14 miles south, and appears to target a native Thai population rather than a more general audience or converts; all of their website and a majority of their Facebook posts and fliers are published in the Thai language. In my research I found no evidence of collaboration on events between this temple and the OKBV.
Just a few blocks away from OKBV lies the Rissho Kosei-Kai Dharma Center, a Mahayana group which has 239 branches in Japan, and half a dozen in the U.S.. This temple practices the subset of Mahayana called Ekayāna, which translates to “one-vehicle”, and is greatly influenced by the Lotus Sutra. Of all the temples in the city, their website’s design is the sleekest, and seems to target people with limited experience or complete newcomers to Buddhism who are interested in meditation. Their head teacher, a woman named Rev. Kris Ladusau, herself a convert from Methodist Christianity, serves as the first white reverend in any of Rissho Kosei-Kai’s temples. The demographics of temple attendees appear split between white and Asian ethnicities. The center seems to take a casual, Protestant approach to Buddhism, where their Facebook page has a number of memes and events which other temples might not offer. For example, they held a screening of The Big Lebowski in 2018, emphasizing the Zen iconography of “The Dude” protagonist. While the Buddhist traditions vary significantly between this temple and OKBV, their proximity within two miles of each other is surprising, especially in a city where Christianity is by far the dominant religion.
Rissho Kosei-kai Center located a couple miles from OKBV (Photo Credit: RKOK Dharma Center website)
The comparison between the RKOK Dharma center and the OKBV also creates an interesting comparison of the choices available to a convert looking to join a Buddhist community, even in a locale as remote as Oklahoma City. The homey nature of the Theravada Vihāra might draw newcomers looking for an intimate experience with authentic monks, where Bhante Ratana is highly educated in both Sanskrit and Pāli languages yet welcomes newcomers. Conversely, the RKOK Center serves a much larger community, in a sizable building complex, and is part of an international network of temples. Considering the predominantly Christian affiliation of many Oklahoma City residents, the variety of temples in the area is impressive, and the fact that a vihāra has successfully operated and recruited new monks for over a decade in Oklahoma suggests that Theravada traditions might continue to prosper in the middle U.S. into the future.
Online Sources:
https://www.facebook.com/OKBuddhistVihara
https://www.dhamma.ru/sadhu/1425-oklahoma-buddhist-center
https://rkok-dharmacenter.org/
https://www.facebook.com/Dharma-Center-Of-Oklahoma-136494919722032/
http://www.watokc.com/index.php/about-temple/religious-place