4th AnnualOracle Reading
Year of the Fire Horse
Lunar New Year with Thich Nhat Hanh. Vietnam, 2005. Photo by Kate Cummings
Join us on February 26 to celebrate the Lunar New Year through the magic and mystery of the Oracle Reading. In the zodiac calendar, 2026 marks the year of the Fire Horse, the mythical animal representing vitality, strength, courageous movement, and unyielding perseverance.
For our fourth annual event, we’ll be guided by senior Dharma teacher, Sister Chan Kinh Nghiem (“Adornment with Respect”). She will offer chanting and also share about the Vietnamese poem, The Tale of Kieu, which offers the historical foundation for this special practice. Sister Kinh Nghiem will be joined by our other oracles, Peggy Rowe Ward and Ava Avalos.
The heart of the event are the oracle readings, where participants are invited to offer a question to the oracles. This may be about an area of your life where you feel uncertain or challenged. The oracle listens, randomly draws a number connected to a stanza from the poem. With that as inspiration, they offer reflections and invitations to the question.
Thursday, February 26
6:00–7:30 pm ET / 3:00–4:30 pm PT
Online + Recorded
Make a Donation
This event is donation based, and we’re grateful for any contribution you’d like to make. Your support helps make programs like this available to as many people as possible.
Teachers & Oracles
Sister Kinh Nghiem is a senior Dharma teacher in Thich Nhat Hanh’s international community of Engaged Buddhism. She ordained on Februray 4, 1998 at the age of 15. As Thich Nhat Hanh’s personal attendant for over 15 years, she has traveled around the world leading mindfulness and meditation retreats for communities, schools, universities, and business corporations. She received full ordination on December 18 in 2001 and the Lamp Transmission in 2006. She currently resides at Deer Park Monastery in southern California, where she enjoys picking wild sage, studying deep Buddhism, and sharing tea and laughter with her sisters and brothers.
Peggy Rowe Ward is the co-founder and Executive Director at The Lotus Institute. She is a senior Dharma teacher trained under Thich Nhat Hanh, a certified trainer at the Trauma Resource Institute, and author of Love’s Garden: A Guide to Mindful Relationships. Through meditation, movement, and art, Peggy offers a path of deep insight that enables her students to discover and embody their most creative and authentic selves.
Ava Avalos is a Dharma teacher, HIV specialist physician, activist & dancer living in Botswana. Originally from Southern California, she weaves together her Mexican roots with those of Africa, where she has worked for over 24 years. Ava is a devoted yogini and brings her wisdom and love of the body, dance and yoga to her Dharma practice.
Her expertise in dissolving embodied knots of confusion, trauma and fear into gateways towards clarity, understanding and courage form the foundation of her teaching, For Ava, compassionately exploring the intergenerational mysteries and the continuously unfolding miracles of the body allow life to be fully lived and celebrated with each breath and passing moment.