Prison Dharma Network Directory

In 2001, the Arcata Zen Group was contacted by an inmate incarcerated in Pelican Bay State Prison, near Crescent City, for help in establishing a Taoist/Buddhist Study Group. AZG members travel to Pelican Bay every Saturday to sit with this sangha. Locally, AZG members lead meditation in both the men's and women's
sections of the Humboldt County Correctional Facility on Thursday
evenings.

Prisons Served: Pelican Bay State Prison, Humboldt County CF

Our group at Attica is a non-sectarian meditation group, meeting every Thursday night for about 2 hours of meditation and a little period for Questions & Discussion afterward. The group was originally started years ago, then languished after a few years. Recently there had been much interest in some of the inmates to re-establish the group, and the Attica Chaplains were considering doing so and leading it themselves, even though they were untrained in meditation (to show how powerful inmates' were becoming!). Just at that juncture, I was given a contact to the former leader, who then directed me to the Chaplain been the original Volunteer Advisor for him. I called her immediately, and was joyously received! The inmates, the Advisor, and of course, I too, were all overjoyed to have found one another just at the right moment!

I have been a member of the Rochester Zen Center for some 40 years, and sitting with the inmates has challenged and deepened my own practice, as well as giving me an opportunity to give something back to the Dharma after so many years of receiving the teaching freely given.

BayNVC’s Safer Communities Project teaches nonviolent communication (NVC) classes in 6-month and year long courses to incarcerated people at San Quentin State Prison and in jails in Sonoma County. Our students behind prison walls learn practical skills founded in self-awareness and compassionate communication that support a shift from blame and judgment into empathic connection, authentic expression and inner freedom.

Weekly classes train students to cope with the real-life challenges of prison life, foster compassionate relationships with their families and other prisoners, and enable incarcerated people who want to change to address many of the issues that have kept them locked into violent patterns of behavior and communication.

A group of volunteers from meditation centers in the Twin Cities, and others interested in human liberation. The Beverly White Community Outreach Project is sponsored by the Minnesota Chapter of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship (BPF). Nationally, the BPF is an organization that has made connections between meditation, non-violence and social justice for 25 years. We are an ecumenical Buddhist effort to teach mindfulness practice to those in difficult circumstances. Affiliated with the Twin Cities BPF. Group goes to Shakopee State Prison (women only), Oak Park Heights Prison (super-max security), Stillwater and St. Cloud (maximum security), Faribault (medium security), Appleton (private prison), and Red Wing (secure juvenile facility). Hour to 2-hour meditations guided by outreach group members at least once a month, day-long retreats have been done in most of the aforementioned facilities.

http://cloudsinwater.org/interest-groups/

Prisons Served: Shakopee State Prison, Oak Park Heights Prison, Stillwater, St. Cloud, Faribault, Appleton, Red Wing

Weekly meditation classes are taught by volunteers at the Suffolk County House of Corrections (the Boston county jail). Drawing from the meditation traditions of Buddhism, mindfulness, yoga, and the martial arts, the program has been successful. Richard Geller has taught since 1996, and Janine Marra since 2010.