Series: Monks in the Morning

Have you ever had something strange happen to you that you couldn’t explain? We’ll start to learn the story of a family that had something really strange, and really scary, happen to them. They couldn’t understand why it was happening. In the end, and in a panic, the went to the wisest person in the world to ask for help—the Supreme Buddha. He was able to offer them protection and also give them an answer to why these things were happening.

Contents

5:31 Part 1 of the story of Kālī the Yakkhini
16:49 Suriya Paritta. Download a PDF or read online.

Related Book

• Mahamevnawa Pali-English Paritta Chanting Book. Print Book.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

We have a very special show today to talk about something very special that happened recently in one of our monasteries. There was a novice ordination ceremony. Do you know what that means? It’s a special event where someone becomes a novice monk. They take the ten precepts and start wearing robes and living as a monk. As a novice monk they then keep all the precepts you may keep on the uposatha when you observe the eight precepts, but they split one of the precepts into two, and they take one more precept to give up using money. we’re gong to speak with one of the monks who attended this ceremony and he’ll tell us all about becoming a monk.

Contents

6:57 Dhamma discussion on a novice ordination ceremony

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

Lots of you have told us how you really like to practice loving-kindness meditation. This makes all the monks so happy to know that even as kids you are learning to train your minds in wholesome qualities. We also want you to remember that thoughts of loving-kindness are not just something we need to have when we meditate. We also need to know when to think in this way in real life. In the sermon today we’ll be reminded of how important it is to watch our minds and make sure that when anger arises that we work hard to replace it with thoughts of loving kindness.

Contents

5:19 Sermon on loving-kindness
16:11 Metta Bhavana: Loving Kindness Meditation Download PDF or MP3.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

The Supreme Buddha taught us it’s very very important that we associate with good people who like to practice the Dhamma. Because when we do, our good qualities increase. But sometimes, we don’t take advantage of being around good people, do we? Today we’ll learn the story of someone like that, who had the chance to spend time learning from an arahant, but instead he cursed him and chased him away. Can you believe it? See how dangerous saṁsara is? Fortunately for this person, he eventually got to meet the Supreme Buddha. I don’t want to give the story away, so you’ll just have to listen.

Theragatha

Read the Verses of Arahant Jambuka in the Theragāthā on SuttaFriends.org.

Dhammapada

70. The foolish ascetic who eats food with the tip of a blade of grass, month after month, is not worth a sixtieth part of the lives of the liberated ones who have realized the Dhamma.

Read the whole Dhammapada chapter on SuttaFriends.org.

Contents

6:05 Dhammapada 70, the story of Arahant Jambuka.
23:20 Vimana Vatthu 6.4 Lodging Giver’s Mansion

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

Have you ever been tricked before? Maybe someone pretended to throw something to you and when you tried to catch it, it wasn’t there. Or maybe someone traded you for something, but what you got wasn’t what they promised. Well, what if I told you that we are all letting ourselves be tricked by the world all the time. That what we think we experience in the world is totally different from reality. And its because we are letting ourselves be tricked that we have to suffer. But the Supreme Buddha wasn’t tricked by the world. He saw things as they really are. In the sermon today, we’ll learn four ways that the world tricks us. They are really important, so you may want to write them down in your Monks in the Morning journal to help you remember.

Contents

5:32 Sermon
14:58 Buddhanussati verses Meditation. Read online or Download PDF.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

Do you have a savings account? Maybe you have a jar that you collect money in that you hope to buy something with in the future. Lots of people do. And people did that in the time of out Supreme Buddha as well. Today we will learn a wonderful sutta called the Nidhikaṇḍa Sutta: The Discourse on Savings. In this sutta, we will learn how the Buddha advised us to save for the future in a way that we are sure to get the benefit of our savings. And at the end of the show, we will get to listen to a recording that one of you made of the whole sutta. It’s really beautiful, so pay attention.

Contents

5:37 Sermon on Khp 8 Nidhikaṇḍa Sutta: The Discourse on Savings
12:25 Maha Mangala Sutta. Read online or download a pdf.
22:37 Listen to the whole Nidhikaṇḍa Sutta: The Discourse on Savings You can read the whole sutta yourself on SuttaFriends.org

Related Book

• Mahamevnawa Pali-English Paritta Chanting Book. Print Book.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

On the programme we talk a lot about how when we practice generosity it leads to being wealthy in the future. The Supreme Buddha says this again and again. Well, today we are going to learn five more benefits of giving. Some of these benefits we can even see right now in this very life. They are good to remember, so I recommend that you write them down in your special Monks in the Morning Journal. You do have a place where you keep track of what you’re learning don’t you? All you need is a small notebook you can keep with you when you listen. It doesn’t have to be anything fancy, but it’s good to keep it just dedicated to things that you learn on the show. That way it will be easy to go back and look things up later.

The Benefits of Giving: Dānānisaṃsa Sutta AN 5.35

“Monks, there are five benefits of giving. What five?

1. A giver, a donor is dear and beloved by many people.
2. Good people associate with them.
3. They get a good reputation.
4. They don’t neglect a layperson’s duties. (keeping the five precepts)
5. When their body breaks up, after death, they’re reborn in a good place, a heavenly realm. These are the five benefits of giving.”

Contents

5:56 Sermon on Dānānisaṃsa Sutta AN 5.35 The Benefits of Giving
11:11 Metta Bhavana: Loving Kindness Meditation Download PDF or MP3.
22:23 Verses of Arahant Nadī Kassapa

Related Book

• The Voice of Enlightened Monks: Theragatha. Get your own copy.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

Today we are going to listen to a really interesting discussion between one of the venerable monks and a couple of kids who have been attending Dhamma programmes for a few years. Among other things, they are going to talk all about the process of making and offering food, or dāna, to the Mahāsangha. You can really tell that they have been learning a lot and putting what they learned into practice. Especially, they talk about good ways of thinking about things. For example, how to think if a monk doesn’t eat something that we offer. Also, what to think about when we are preparing the food we will offer. You know, we can’t always control the world around us, but we can learn to control the way we think. So let’s see what we can learn from these kids today.

Contents

4:57 Discussion: Kids Offering Dana
19:57 Mora Paritta. Read online or download a pdf.

For Reading

• Mahamevnawa Pali-English Paritta Chanting Book. Get your own copy.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

Today we’ll learn the rest of the Puññābhisanda sutta. You know, when we think about merit, many people only think about the physical things we do with our bodies, like giving things to the Saṅgha, or making offerings to the Supreme Buddha. Or maybe they think about things we do with our voices like reciting parittas. Well, in this sutta we learn about having confidence in the triple gem is also a kind of merit. And not just a little merit, but an overflowing source of merit. The Supreme Buddha once taught us that “Faith is the seed.” Saddhā bījaṁ. If we have faith or confidence in the Triple then from that can grow immeasurable good qualities. It’s even the cause leading up to stream entry. So lets think more about this today.

Contents

5:41 Final Sermon on the Puññābhisandha Sutta
16:24 Karaniya Metta Sutta. Read online or download a PDF.

Related Book

• Mahamevnawa Pali-English Paritta Chanting Book. Get your own copy.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.

In the last episode we started to learn the Puññābhisanda Sutta, the way to always have merit flowing into our lives. The first way is to have strong confidence in the enlightenment of the Supreme Buddha. The way that we can get this is by learning about the qualities of his mind and how his mind is different than our own minds. We can see how easily we get attached to things. We have favorite clothes, favorite foods, favorite TV shows and games. But the Supreme Buddha didn’t have any of these things. His mind was completely unattached to these kinds of things and he taught the way for us to also become unattached. This is why we can have unshakable confidence in him. We’ll learn more about that today.

Contents

5:35 Sermon on the Puññābhisanda Sutta Sutta AN 4.52
14:42 Benifits of Loving-Kindness
16:23 Metta Bhavana: Loving Kindness Meditation Download PDF or MP3.

We’d love to hear from you! Send us a voicemail. Or record a longer segment on your phone. You can write to us at info@serenecolombo.org or contact us through Facebook at facebook.com/ColomboDhammaFriends or Instagram at instagram.com/SereneColombo. You can also sent us a voicemail on Whatsapp.