Soto Zen practice in Portland, Oregon
Where the plum opens before the rest of the garden wakes
A low voice at the gate
Baika Zen Center offers practice in the Soto tradition of Japan, in the lineage of Gido Sekiun Daiosho, Reizan Tokuho Roshi, and Thomas Ridley Roshi. We sit together in a small garden at the foot of Mount Tabor. Whether you are new to Zen or have sat for thirty years, you are warmly welcome.
Come sit with us — the schedule is herePractice
Mornings at six.
Sundays at nine.
- Tuesday6:00 AM – 7:20 AMMorning Zazen
- Thursday6:00 AM – 7:20 AMMorning Zazen
- Saturday7:00 AM – 8:30 AMMorning Zazen
- Sunday9:00 AM – 11:00 AMZazen, Kinhin & Dharma Talk
First time?
Come ten or fifteen minutes early. Shoes come off at the entrance. Nobody expects you to know what you are doing your first morning — watch the person beside you and follow.
Walking as practice
Slow down; observe.
Walking the garden is a practice in itself. Every stone, every planting, every raked path asks you to slow down. Thomas Ridley — our founding abbot, and a landscape architect long before he was a monk — laid these gardens out by hand; they were his teaching in stone and water, and they still are.
A garden is never finished. It is only tended — this morning, and again tomorrow morning.
Our teachers
One person to one person.
Our teachers carry the transmission of Zen practice in the lineage of Reizan Tokuho Roshi and Gido Sekiun Daiosho. They are here to support your practice, one person at a time.
Ken Sugihara (Baiho Genryu)
Sensei
Came to sitting through twenty years of hospice work; began Zen with Baido Roshi in 2001; ordained at Tokuun-ji, Japan in 2011; received transmission in 2019.
Naomi Iwata (Hoen Jikai)
Sensei
Practiced six years in a Rinzai lineage before coming here for one-on-one training with Baido Roshi; ordained at Tokuun-ji in 2014; received transmission in 2021.
- Gido Sekiun Daiosho
- Reizan Tokuho Roshi
- Thomas Ridley Roshi (Baido Osho)
The lineage of Baika, through Tokuun-ji temple in Hida, Japan.
What transmission means
Not a credential, but a long friendship.
Practice here is passed person to person, through years of sitting in the same room. Our teachers were ordained at Tokuun-ji, our sister temple in the mountains of Hida, and return there for the ceremonies that tie this garden to the temple where Baido Osho trained. This is what lineage means: not a credential, but a long friendship.
News
A living community, moving forward.
- Jan 4, 2026The roof is on the new zendoBuilding Project
- Dec 30, 2025Taking down the old barnBuilding Project
- Dec 15, 2025Ordination in Japan for Naomi IwataNews
Building project
Impermanence, held calmly.
The old carriage barn that held our practice for eighteen years has come down, taken apart with a small ceremony on a wet December morning. For now we sit in the house on Plumfield Lane, and a new zendo is going up on the same ground. The garden remains.
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