in the photo: Bhante Sujato speaking at the annual ABC event in 2018.
Ven. Bhikkhuni Dhammananda (Assoc. Prof. Dr.Chatsumarn Kabilsingh) started out as a Buddhist Academic in 1970s and turned activist in1980s.
Through more than four decades of experience with Buddhists in Asian countries both as an academic and an activist, she saw very clearly that Asian Buddhists needed to nurture each other. With a lack of technology, limited personal resources and material supports, she realized that Buddhism could only prosper and meet the challenges of the modern world if Asian Buddhists came together to pool their resources and hence, make possible various projects which otherwise could not happen if each country worked individually.
For this reason, Asian Buddhism Connection (ABC) started to evolve, moving to different countries to tap into the unique resources of each the member country in order to share with others.
Through, ABC each Asian Buddhist country can share resources which will facilitate facing the challenges of the modern world. ABC works to serve as a role model for Asian Buddhists to express their capability to show how Buddhism is lived in the actual day-to-day world.
How it began: ABC started out very simply in 2015 to celebrate Venerable Bhikkhuni Dhammananda’s 71st birthday. At the time, ABC stood for ASEAN Bhikkhunis Conference. Songdhammakalyani organized the event at the University of Nakhon Pathom. Bhikkhunis attended from Vietnam, Indonesia, Malaysia, Thailand and India.
The event went very well. 500 people among them, students, bhikkhus and bhikkhunis attended the conference in the morning and another 500 in the afternoon.
The following year, 2016 Songdhammakalyani hosted another ABC. This time, it spanned out to cover the fourfold Buddhist communities, so ABC2 transformed into ASEAN Buddhists Conference. The conference was organized at the same venue and this time there were participants from twenty two countries. At the opening session, more than a hundred monks and bhikkhunis participated. The most Venerable Phra Mahacetiyacharya, the provincial chief bhikkhu came to grace the opening session. Venerable Ajahn Brahm flew in from Australia to offer his opening speech, which was very appropriately called, “We are on the right side of history.”
His Holiness the Dalai Lama having heard of ABC conference in Thailand kindly sent a message to be read at the opening session as well. He also sent a Tibetan nun to participate at this meaningful conference.
ABC2 was a great success. ABC3 was hosted in Indonesia by the Sangha Agung Indonesia, the Indonesian Buddhist Women Fellowship (Wanita Buddhis Indonesia), the Smaratungga Buddhist College and the Prasadha Jinarakkhita Buddhist Institute. Venerable Bhikkhuni Thitacarini played an important role as the local connecting person and secretary, while Dr. Amarjiva Lochan was secretary of ABC international.
The venue was held at Sangha Agung Indonesia headquarters in Jakarta.
There were great number of participants from 16 countries and the participation of the local Indonesians from various islands was very impressive.
On the last day of the conference, the venue moved to the temple of Ven. Master Jinarakkhita, the founder of Sangha Agung Indonesia as well as a pioneer of the revival of Buddhism in Indonesia after being silent for 500 years.
It was decided that the following ABC conference would be held in Nepal, in Lumbini, the birthplace of Siddhartha Gautama, the man who would become the Buddha. It was planned to be held in November 2019 but unfortunately, it had to be cancelled because of the Covid pandemic. Eventually, it was held in March 25th and 26th, 2022 as a virtual international conference on “Corona Pandemic, Desperate Humanity and Response of Buddhism”
ABC5 will again be held in Nepal although a date has not yet been confirmed.