A FRIEND TO ALL
Ven. Bhante Suhita Dharma taught through his good deeds.
“EXPERIENCE IS the best teacher when it comes spiritual practice,” the late Ven. Bhante Suhita Dharma once said, reflecting on his own life.
Born into the Jim Crow South, the racism he endured led him to explore spirituality. Early in life, he found safe haven in Catholicism, and after reading Thomas Merton at the age of fourteen, he was among the last “child monks” to enter the Catholic Trappist order in Texas.
Suhita Dharma remained with the order for a decade before traveling throughout Asia to learn about meditation. Adhering to the Merton adage, “Monks are monks, regardless of the religion,” he practiced at monasteries and temples from Nepal to Hong Kong. His journey culminated in Los Angeles, where Suhita Dharma met the Venerable Thich Thien An, the first Vietnamese Buddhist to teach in America. Soon after this encounter, Suhita was ordained by Thich Thien An, becoming the first-ever African American Buddhist monk.
As a new bhikku, Suhita Dharma helped resettle refugees from Southeast Asia who came to America after the Vietnam War. A few years later, during the AIDS crisis, Suhita Dharma turned his small temple, Metta Vihara, into a hospice. He often accompanied residents to appointments to make sure they received their medication and benefits. Even with slim resources, Suhita Dharma expanded his hospice program to three houses to serve AIDS patients.
He supported his monasticism as a social worker in LA and led an interfaith program at a federal prison. He also taught at various dharma centers in LA and beyond, and toward the end of his life founded the Seeds of Compassion Buddhist Center in Juarez, Mexico.
“I have found ways in which a bhikkhu can be of service,” Suhita Dharma humbly stated in a meditation on his extraordinary life. He died in 2014.
TEACHING: THE ONLY THING YOU OWN
Everything in this world is impermanent. No one lives forever; we all must die someday.
We must understand the nature of life from
