Refuge Retreat

November 5 – 12

Refuge Retreat is the first  of the four great preliminary guides that we need to practice if we want to enter into Buddhism and  make progress on our spiritual path to enlightenment. Through training in sincerely going for refuge we enter the gateway to Buddhism; and training in the compassionate mind of bodhichitta we enter the gateway to the Mahayana – the main path to the state of enlightenment.

If we do not have a practice of refuge in the Three Jewels – Buddha, Dharma and Sangha – we will not enter Buddhism and this means we have no opportunity to attain permanent liberation from suffering or the supreme happiness of Enlightenment. Then we will have lost the meaning of human life.

There will be four guided sessions a day, except when there are tsog offering Pujas, and the practice is accomplished within the sadhana Essence of Good Fortune.