Happy Paryushan! The Jain holiday of Paryushan falls September 10th to 17th for Swetambars and September 18th to 27th for Digambars this year. Paryushan is an 8-10 day Jain festival for people to renew their faith and practice penance and the core principles of Jainism. It comes at a time when wandering monks take up temporary residence in villages during the Monsoon season. During this time, Jains will take up religious practices above and beyond what they normally practice, often to the same level of penance that monks practice. Jains will commonly
fast, take up strict diets, seek forgiveness for the violence they've purposefully or accidentally committed, meditate, discuss, and repent for their sins through pratikraman. We have several things planned for Paryushan this year, which you are very welcome to attend. And feel free to invite your friends as well! · First Pratikraman: Tonight at 9:30pm.
Sohum Daftary is leading an English recitation of Swetambar, specifically Stanakvasi, Pratikraman in the Music Practice Room in Ware McClelland in the Quad. See the attached doc for more details! Although the Partikraman is Stanakvasi, we hope Jains of all sects will attend :) Contact Sohum at (972)-974-8020 if you have any questions. Note, his phone will be off during Pratikraman, so let him know before 9:30 if you're coming and need help getting there. · Jain Discussions: dates and locations TBD.
We will have several casual discussions throughout the 18 days of Paryushan for us to meet up and talk about the significance of Paryushan and how it applies to our lives. We will let you know about details as they become available. · Paryushan Event: dates and locations TBD.
We are planning a larger outdoor Paryushan event for either the Sept 19/20 weekend or the Sept 26/27 weekend. We hope you can all make this event! It'll be a great way to learn more about Paryushan and spread awareness of Paryushan and Jainism to the larger Penn and Philly community! We will let you know about details as we keep planning. There will also be a Facebook event. · Paryushan Meals.
We are distributing subsidized Jain-friendly meals for those of us who are practicing strict diets. If you ordered meals and haven't picked the up yet, please pick them up ASAP. Unfortunately, we are not accepting any more meal requests because we've already put in the order. Contact us personally if you'd like to order and we'll let you know if we have extra. · If you have any ideas or initiatives you'd like to propose, we'd love to hear them and work with you to make them happen. We're a pretty small community at Penn, so we really want to cater to your needs. We sincerely hope you have a great Paryushan and that you get some time to think about your true self: Who am I? Jeev or body? Where did I come from? Where should I be? What is my relationship to my bondages? And what can I do to get rid of these? I hope you make positive steps to understand yourself and move towards a path of liberation.
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