Teachers
So-on Jim Hare
Board of Directors, Practice Committee, Teachers
Paravrrti Doralee Grindler Katonah
Board of Directors, Practice Committee, Teachers
Serves as Ino, or head of the meditation hall. She studied in the Soto Zen lineage with Sojun Diane Martin, founder and guiding teacher of Udumbara Zen Center in Illinois and Rev. Val Szymanski, Head Priest of Bamboo in the Wind Zen Sangha in California. She was priest ordained in 2019.
Rev. Myo Lahey
Teachers
Rev. Myo Lahey is the guiding teacher for our sangha. Rev. Myo became interested in Zen as a teenager and started full-time residential practice at the San Francisco Zen Center in 1982. He received dharma transmission from Tenshin Reb Anderson in 1999 and served as head of practice at Tassajara Zen Mountain Monastery from 2000 – 2002. He is now Abbot of Hartford Street Zen Center in San Francisco. (http://www.hszc.org)
The Board of Directors
Will Angelopoulos
Board of Directors
Will is valued member of Valley Streams and has served on the Board of Directors and manages the website development committee.
So-on Jim Hare
Board of Directors, Practice Committee, Teachers
Serves as Tanto, or head of practice. He lived in the San Francisco Zen Center community from 1980 to 1984, was lay ordained by Tenshin Reb Anderson in 1985, and priest ordained by Myo Lahey in 2016. He served as Head Student at Green Gulch Farm during the spring 2002 practice period.
Paravrrti Doralee Grindler Katonah
Board of Directors, Practice Committee, Teachers
Serves as Ino, or head of the meditation hall. She studied in the Soto Zen lineage with Sojun Diane Martin, founder and guiding teacher of Udumbara Zen Center in Illinois and Rev. Val Szymanski, Head Priest of Bamboo in the Wind Zen Sangha in California. She was priest ordained in 2019.
Malia McCarthy
Board of Directors
Malia is a member of the Valley Streams Board of Directors and serves as secretary.
Sarah O’Gara
Board of Directors, Practice Committee
Sarah has practiced in several different Buddhist traditions including Nichiren Shoshu’s Soka Gakkai, Chan as taught by Master Sheng Yen and, for the past 14 years, in the Soto Zen lineage of Shunryu Suzuki Roshi. She shares her avocation for botany and the natural world leading hikes for the Sacramento Valley Conservancy and to the vernal pools at Rancho Seco and Jepson Prairie. She also enjoys tending a drought tolerant native plant garden around her home. As a former camp cook for Forest Service backcountry work crews, her joy is to cook for sangha events and volunteer with trail maintenance and invasive week removal projects.
Kyūshin Larry Smith
Board of Directors
Kyūshin Larry Smith is a retired attorney with over 35 years of practice of law in the Sacramento community. He has been practicing with Valley Streams since February, 2017 and has served as its Treasurer since October, 2018. Larry was lay ordained in the Soto Zen lineage in November, 2021. Larry also serves on the Valley Streams Doanryo and has offered service in numerous other matters including performing a variety of audio-visual tasks.
Charles Stolzenbach
Board of Directors
Charles is a long time Valley Steams member and serves on Valley Stream’s Board of Directors.