Via Thich Nhat Hanh Foundation

 

 

 

Prayer for the New Year

Today, the 31st January 2022 marks the eve of the Lunar New Year, known in Vietnam as “Tet.” This was Thay’s favorite time of the year, as it always marks the coming together of our spiritual family in an intimate and relaxed way with poetry, gentle music, the hanging of simple poetic couplets, and “the fragrance of Zen.” When Thay first ordained and received the novice precepts, his teacher gave him the monastic Dharma name “Phùng Xuân” 逢春 which means "Meeting the Spring." In welcoming Tet this year, we will be honoring Thay’s memory and the spirit of “meeting the warmth of spring” in every moment.

Ashes of our teacher on the altar

As we welcome the new year tonight in our monasteries around the world, we will do as Thay always taught us to do, and present to the Ancestors’ Altar our formal aspiration or “New Year’s Prayer” for the year to come: … Dear Respected Thay, you are a beautiful continuation of spiritual and blood ancestors across the ages, like a lotus in a sea of humanity. In your whole life of practice you have made an infinite contribution towards peace in ourselves and peace in the world. You encourage us to come home to ourselves, to be present for one another, to be as one body, to breathe as one body, and to go together as a river. You bridge differences and fill chasms, and always find the most beautiful gems in each culture and in each faith in order to enrich our path of practice, and inspire in us a direction and a course of action to take so that we can contribute to humanity’s collective wisdom, so that Buddha Maitreya—the Buddha of Love—can manifest each day in the form of a sangha.   Dear Thay, as we end the year, and as your physical body may play hide and seek, we give ourselves permission to grieve, to cry and to remember you. At the same time we come home to the present moment, looking deeply to recognize you in each brother and each sister, each flower bud and new leaf, in each passing cloud and beautiful walking path—in the many wonders of life. Some of us have been your life-long students, some have been to retreats, some have read your books, and some may have never met you but have spent moments enjoying a cup of tea in silence or admiring nature’s beauty with clear eyes—in one way or another, we know you, Thay, and we can recognize you in our very own practice. Read the New Year's Prayer in Full