Next week, the city of Oakland will officially dedicate a massive bronze statue called “Remember Them: Champions for Humanity.” Created by sculptor Mario Chiodo, it features 25 humanitarians from around the world — along with Thich Nhat Hanh, other honorees include Abraham Lincoln, Harvey Milk, Maya Angelou, and Mahatma Gandhi.

Click here to see a detail of Thich Nhat Hanh’s depiction, and click here to see a full list of honorees. You can also visit the Remember Them Facebook page to see photos of the monument throughout its construction. The dedication is happening on Friday, May 31, at 3 p.m. at the Henry J. Kaiser Memorial Park in Oakland.

For more on Thich Nhat Hanh, visit our Spotlight page of his teachings.

“I have witnessed an emerging and growing community, the deepening and sincere cultivation of dharma practice, and incredible kindness and generosity,” she said in a statement. Klyne has been practicing at CIMC since 1986 and has worked as its director for 14 years. She said she plans to continue teaching at CIMC and at other dharma centers.

“This sangha is incredibly dear to me and I am grateful for your love and support of CIMC over the years,” Klyne said. “I have called on so many of you to assist the center throughout my time here. You have helped keep the center financially sound, volunteered your time, served on the board, on committees, and so much more. But without a doubt the aspect that I am most grateful and most appreciative of is your on-going practice.”

Guiding teachers Larry Rosenberg, Narayan Liebenson Grady, and Michael Liebenson Grady thanked Klyne for her service, saying that she has “improved all aspects of the center with her talents, energy, and most of all her heart.”

A Vesak celebration in Sri Lanka, 2011

Buddhists around the world are gearing up for Vesak, the annual celebration of the Buddha’s birthday. The full moon in May, for many, marks the day that the Buddha was born. On the same day, many Buddhist communities also celebrate major events in the Buddha’s life, mainly his attainment of enlightenment and his parinirvana. Vesak Day has Southeast Asian origins, and while it might be considered a Theravadan holiday, other Buddhist traditions, including Zen and some Tibetan, choose to celebrate Vesak Day.

For many groups, the holiday falls on May 24 this year, but celebrations have been taking place throughout May and are scheduled into June. The difference in dates is partially due to the complications of using a lunar calendar, as well as the needs and availability of each center’s practitioners.

Many Buddhist groups are celebrating the holiday in the coming weeks, including Karma Triyana Dharmachakra, the Vermont Zen Center, the Toronto Zen Center, and more. Others, including many Buddhists in Korea, celebrated earlier — click here to see a slideshow from a Vesak parade in Seoul last weekend.

Photo: Gerald Pereira via Flickr, CC-BY license.

Look for the Summer Buddhadharma later this month — if you’re not a subscriber, click here to subscribe and save. In the meantime, you can browse excerpts of everything in the Spring Buddhadharma here.

The Central Tibetan Administration is calling upon Tibetans and their supporters with expressions of solidarity for Tibet and by contacting government officials to urge action to improve human rights conditions in Tibet. All are requested to pray for the at least 117 Tibetans who have self-immolated since 2009.

(Photo by Kevin Wong via Flickr, CC-BY license)

The videos will be available online through July 17, so even if you can’t watch this weekend, you can take part in your own time. For more information, and to register, click here.

Saunders is the founder and head teacher of Sweetwater Zen Center, near San Diego. She was a student of the late Taizan Maezumi Roshi and is a dharma successor of Roshi Bernie Glassman. Click here to read more.

A young Nanao Sakaki oversaw the proceedings by way of this blown-up photo; Gary Snyder addresses the gathering. Photos and below text by Steve Silberman.

Friday night, in celebration of his new book of collected poems, How to Live on Planet Earth, the San Francisco Poetry Center and Green Arcade Books hosted a tribute to Nanao Sakaki in a mattress factory. The event featured Gary Snyder, Michael McClure, Joanne Kyger, Patricia Wakida, Gary Lawless, Dale Pendell, Malcolm Margolin, and other poets and friends. It was a marvelous evening.

Nanao was a wonderful Japanese poet, ecological activist, and Zen rascal. When he was growing up in Japan during World War II, he was drafted into the army. He was on radar duty the day that an American B-29 brought death to Nagasaki; he saw the little blip come in on his screen, and then the mushroom cloud rising in the distance. (“It’s a volcanic eruption!” some of the soldiers said.) After that, he became a lifelong wanderer, free Zen spirit “in the lineage of the desert rat,” original Japanese hippie and founder of a commune on Suwa-no-se Island, and friend of American Beat poets including Snyder and Allen Ginsberg.

I had the pleasure of spending a couple of days with him, Gary, and Allen in the 1980s that included the most intense breakfast I’ve ever had: buckwheat soba with lots of wasabi, oysters on the half shell, green tea, and beer. He was quite old by then, but as we were walking in San Jose, he suddenly climbed a tree like a young man climbs a staircase.

Nanao died in 2008.

The Interdependence Project

The IDP is also offering a Monday night course in August on cultivating compassion and the other three immeasurables; click here for more information.