Dai Jiyu David Ketter moved to Bellingham in 2019 and began practicing zen in early 2021 with Diane Musho Roshi Hamilton of Two Arrows Zen in Salt Lake City. Wishing to have an in-person sangha to practice with, he began practicing with Red Cedar Zen later that year. Previous to practicing zen, David practiced Vipassana meditation for 12 years. During this time he attended numerous 10-day meditation retreats, practiced at a dharma study center in Thailand for a month and led two study abroad programs there focused on Engaged Buddhism. He has also attended multiple sesshins with both Two Arrows Zen and with Red Cedar Zen, and he received the precepts from Diane Hamilton in 2023.

Professionally, David worked in education, mostly teaching middle and high school science, but he also worked as an administrator of a professional development program for teachers and began his career in education as a work site supervisor and education program coordinator for an urban conservation corps in Oakland, CA. His passion throughout his entire career has been to connect students to nature in a way that transformed the way they thought about, perceived and related to their environment. At the center of this work was helping students perceive the interconnectedness of all things. Most recently, David served as a climate change education consultant for Washington State. 

Member Barbara Noda

Barbara Noda's first introduction to Zen Buddhism was at Tassajara Hot Springs in Carmel Valley during the70’s. She backpacked in from Arroyo Seco, was greeted by a monk named Tony who showed her where to get tea, buy bread, and put down her sleeping bag. Since those days, she has returned many, many times to Tassajara as a guest or to attend workshops.

For a time during the 80’s, Barbara lived at the house of Mayumi Oda in Muir Beach near San Francisco Zen Center’s Green Gulch Farm. Mayumi Oda is an intensely devoted Zen Buddhist and renowned artist of Goddesses and paintings that embrace her spiritual path. Barbara helped Mayumi prepare the revision to her book Goddesses in 1988. She also assisted Mayumi in organizing and leading retreats for women and Asian women at her house in Muir Beach. Musim Patricia Ikeda, a Buddhist teacher and community activist, also lived with Barbara at Mayumi’s house. More recently, Barbara was part of a small sangha in Walnut Creek and also a member of the San Francisco Zen Center sangha.

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Member Scott Allen

Bio coming soon

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Member Terrill Thompson

Terrill Thompson began practicing zen in 1988 at Kansas Zen Center in Lawrence (Kwan Um School of Zen, under Zen Master Seung Sahn). In the late 1990s his practice transitioned to the Soto Zen lineage of Suzuki Roshi, first at the Chapel Hill Zen Center in North Carolina, then at Red Cedar Zen Community (RCZC) when he and his family moved to Bellingham in 2001. Over his 20+ years in Bellingham he has maintained a steady practice and has been especially active in RCZC's Wilderness Program. He took the precepts with Zoketsu Norman Fischer and Nomon Tim Burnett in 2010.   

Professionally, Terrill has worked since the early 1990s in the technology accessibility field, dedicated to improving the accessibility of websites, videos, software, hardware, and other technologies for individuals with disabilities. Since 2001 he has conducted this work while employed at the University of Washington.  He has been active in multiple professional organizations, including EDUCAUSE (a nonprofit association focused on information technology in higher education), where he founded the IT Accessibility Community Group in 2007 and served as its leader through 2012; and Access Technology Higher Education Network (ATHEN), a nonprofit association that he co-founded in 2002 and served as vice president from 2007 through 2010.