TRISTATE DHARMA HISTORY

In the 1980’s, two women deeply committed to learning about meditation found each other at Grailville, a retreat center and organic farm for the Grail Movement, located in Loveland, Ohio. The Grail is an international women’s organization dedicated to social justice, spiritual growth and ecology.

Pat Dolan and Mary Ellen Landolina created Tristate Dharma in stages. First, “we wanted to fill up our ignorance,” remembers Mary Ellen. So they brought Zen and Vipassana teachers to Grailville and held weekly sittings open to the public.

The retreats attracted enough community members that, in stage two, they moved the retreats to Oakwood Farm, a retreat center near Muncie, Indiana. “Then we needed a brochure, a logo and a name,” said Mary Ellen. “So Pat came up with the name out of necessity.”

Stage three established the Sangha as a non-profit, with a more permanent meeting place at Earth Connections on the campus of Mt. St. Joseph College, on the west side of Cincinnati.

From the very beginning, volunteers created and keep Tristate Dharma alive as a Sangha, without a designated teacher. Mary Ellen and Pat wrote this into the original mission statement, a structure which continues today. Everyone has wisdom to share.