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Dharma Rain Zen Center
Soto Zen practice, serene gardens, and a welcoming community for all ages in Portland.
4.2
School
$$
Soto Zen practice, serene gardens, and a welcoming community for all ages in Portland.
Dharma Rain Zen Center in Portland invites all ages to explore Soto Zen practice. The center features a Buddhist library, walking meditation garden, oak savanna habitat, orchard, and flower and vegetable gardens, plus a Frog Song preschool and playground. It offers free and sliding-scale classes, zazen sessions, retreats, and a welcoming sangha.
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Guided sessions in Soto Zen meditation, suitable for beginners and advanced practitioners.
Multi-day immersive retreats for deep spiritual practice and mindfulness training.
Regular gatherings and activities for all ages to foster connection and support.
Includes Frog Song preschool and playground activities to introduce mindfulness to kids.
A Buddhist library with resources for study and personal growth.
Walking meditation gardens, orchards, and natural habitats for peaceful reflection.
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Overall rating
I I
This is a wonderful place for anyone to discover the joy of meditation in the Soto Zen tradition. Dharma Rain is full of healing activities, with its Frog Song preschool and children's playground, Buddhist library, gorgeous oak savanna habitat acreage, orchard, walking meditation garden, and flower and vegetable gardens. Many free and sliding scale donation classes, sessions of zazen, meditation retreats, and other activities. And best of all, an energetic, all ages sangha (religious community). Its grounds also include the free access Siskiyou Pathway.
M
It's been awhile since this happened but I wanted to share my experience. I haven't been back since. When I attended for Sunday service two summers ago, they would let people bring water bottles into the zendo which of course, would fall down, get slammed, etc.. it was very distracting. They also let people bring cell phones into the zendo and the phones would go off intermittently. This wouldn't be a big deal if I didn't get a strange and unwanted physical correction from one of the senior students or staff there, I don't know what their position was. All I know is while we were alternating between standing and prostrating this woman behind me put both her hands on my shoulders to try to correct my stance. It scared me, as I'm a trauma survivor so I struggled to break free which she took as an invitation to hold firmer. Absolutely disturbing. I hope they learned from this incident. I had just moved to Portland and was struggling so much to make friends and find community and wondered why on earth no one who was actually distracting got corrected but I was in such an intense way. Zen mountain monastery would never do this and they're notoriously strict.
Francisco The obsolescence
The Blueberry Pancakes are Amazing 🤩😻!!! And lo and behold all the stars aligned, It's where I met Sasha Obiquat. We have not stopped making out all week. Praise Buddha!!!
K. Ching
kids and I took the introduction meditation class on Saturday. Very good teacher. Nice temple. Well kept grounds. Kids were 8, 13, & 14 & 49.
NOZENJI
Dharma Rain is a wonderful place with wonderful people. The practice has a unique style that I believe was developed by Jiyu Kennet-Roshi. It has what feels to me like some Christian flavor to it, and a lot of wonderful rituals. It's unique in that way to other Zen Centers that I have attended long term, like SFZC and ZCSD. Some people might prefer Zen Community of Oregon for a more traditional Japanese form of practice, and some people might prefer Zen Center of Portland for a less traditionally Japanese form of Zen practice. Portland also has other Zen Centers, but I am unfamiliar with them.
