Bhante Walpola Piyananda
Chief Sangha Nayake, of America / Dharma Vijaya, Buddhist Vihara, Los Angeles CA

Abbot & President of Dharma Vijaya Buddhist Vihara
Chief Sangha Nayake of America
President, Sri Lankan Sangha Council of United States & Canada
President Buddhist Sangha Council of Southern California
Member of Inter Religious Council of Los Angeles

Ven. Dr. Piyananda came to the United States on July 4, 1976.  Upon arriving, the first thing that he did was ride on a float in the Fourth of July Parade in San Francisco.  The monks that he was to stay with had taken him directly from the airport to the parade.

Bhante Walpola Piyananda is the founder-president and Abbot of Dharma Vijaya Buddhist Vihara in Los Angeles, California.  He was born in 1943, in Walpola, a rural village in Sri Lanka.  At the age of twelve, Bhante was ordained as a novice monk.  He gave up his birth name, taking the name of his village “Walpola,” and was given the Buddhist name Piyananda, meaning “pleasant joy.”  Upon assuming the name of his village as his new “surname,” in accordance with Sri Lankan tradition, he showed that he now belonged not to his biological family, but to his entire village, typically the widest level of organization in a traditional rural society.

Bhante received his full ordination as a monk in 1970, and after completing his education in Sri Lanka (B.A. Hon. Kaleniya University) and India (M.A. Calcutta University), he came to the United States for further studies.  Bhante received an additional M.A. from Northwestern University in Chicago in 1980, and in 1985 he completed his requirements for his Ph.D. at U.C.L.A.  he also received a Ph.D. from the College of Buddhist Studies in Los Angeles in 1997. www.dharmavijaya.org

• The Bodhi Tree Grows in L.A.: Tales of a Buddhist Monk in America, Shambhala ((2008))
• Saffron Days in LA: Tales of a Buddhist Monk in America, Shambhala (2001)
• Meditation in Loving Kindness (2003)
• Love in Buddhism, Corporate Buddhist Association of the United States (2001)