SZBA Staff & Board of Directors
Kigen Anna Breckenridge
(Operations Manager) Oakland, California
As a longtime lay practitioner, Anna was drawn to her current position at the SZBA by the opportunity to serve Soto Zen Buddhist priests and their communities. She is a member of Kannon Do Zen Meditation Center and enjoys visiting surrounding practice centers. She was ordained by Keido Les Kaye in October 2023. Her current interests include gardening, cooking, and expanding access and equity in Soto Zen practice.
Jiko Zena MaNais
(Program Coordinator) Atlanta, Georgia
In 2019, Zena became a formal member of the Zen Buddhist community. She has a diverse professional background in program management, research coordination, data analysis, and corporate learning, with expertise in health care, public health, educational technology, and event planning. Zena joined the team at the Soto Zen Buddhist Association to create engaging programs that enrich the learning experiences of the community. An avid baseball fan, Zena loves fishing, taking long walks, writing, and traveling.
Dhammadīpā Cardenas
(Board President) Alexandria, Virginia
Dhammadīpā Cardenas, the founder of Dassanāya Buddhist Community, is a fully ordained bhikkhuni in the Theravāda tradition, and a Dharma Transmitted teacher in the Suzuki Roshi lineage of Soto Zen. In addition to English, Ayyā teaches in Spanish, an expression of her Latin heritage. She is an author whose work has appeared in the Buddhist publications "Lion's Roar" and the "Buddhadharma" magazine. Her recent book is titled, "Gifts Greater Than the Oceans: Benefits of the Buddhist Practice of Giving." Ayyā is the mother of a lovely adult daughter, and enjoys sewing and watercolor painting.
Ben Connelly
(Vice President) Minneapolis, Minnesota
Ben Connelly is a Soto Zen priest and Dharma heir in the Katagiri lineage. He also teaches mindfulness in a wide variety of secular contexts including police training and addiction recovery groups. He works with multifaith groups focused on intersectional liberation, racial justice, and climate justice, and has served on the SZBA DEIA committee for three years. Ben is based at Minnesota Zen Meditation Center, travels to teach across the United States, has written for Tricycle and Lion’s Roar magazines, and is author of Inside the Grass Hut, Inside Vasubandhu's Yogacara, and Mindfulness and Intimacy.
Geido Ann Grossman
(Secretary) Delray Beach, FL
Geido was introduced to Zen practice at Village Zendo and became a student of Roshi Enkyo O’Hara. She relocated to Florida in 2017, and became a member of the Southern Palm Zen Group. Under the guidance of Sensei Jane Jishin Faysash, Geido’s practice path turned towards serving the Sangha as priest and she received priest ordination in November of 2019. Geido resides in Delray Beach with her husband, Bernie, and their cat, Izzy.
Koshin Steven Tierney
(Treasurer) San Francisco, California
Steven Tierney, Kai Po Koshin, was ordained as a Soto Zen priest in 2013 and received Dharma Transmission in November 2021 from Horyu Ryotan Cynthia Kear.
Dr. Tierney is a psychotherapist in private practice and a Professor Emeritus of Counseling Psychology at the CA Institute of Integral Studies. He is a Certified Addiction Specialist and has been named a Diplomate in Clinical Mental Health by the American Mental Health Counselors Association. He is also a certified suicide prevention and intervention trainer, providing workshops and classes for the past decade.
Rakugo Castaldo
East Lansdowne, Pennsylvania
Rakugo is a Soto Zen priest at Soji Zen Center, in the White Plum lineage, in Lansdowne, PA. She began studying with Shuzen Harris, abbot of Soji, in 2011. She teaches English at Widener University in Chester PA. She has been the chair of the SZBA DEIA committee since 2017. She loves Shakespeare, cats, and chocolate in equal measure.
Inryū Bobbi Poncé-Barger
Washington D.C.
Inryu Bobbi Ponce-Barger is a Soto Zen Buddhist priest in the lineage of Shunryu Suzuki. The name Shin Chi Inryu, (身知隱竜) “Body Wisdom Hidden Dragon” was the Dharma name given to her by Dairyū Michael Wenger Roshi in 2005. Inryū received Dharma Transmission from Dairyū Wenger Roshi in July 2017. She is a founding member of and serves as the Guiding Teacher and resident priest for All Beings Zen Sangha located in Washington DC. Inryū enjoys viewing the horizon and the poetry of Shide and Hānshān.
Teresa Bouza
Ortigueira (La Coruña), Spain
Teresa Bouza is a journalist, a caregiver, and a Zen practitioner. She was born in Latin America, grew up in Spain, and spent most of her professional career in the US. A recipient of the John S. Knight Journalism Fellowship at Stanford, she worked for The Wall Street Journal, Spain’s global news agency EFE, and TV station Univision. She is a co-author with her teacher, Les Kaye, of “A Sense of Something Greater: Zen and the Search for Balance in Silicon Valley.” Teresa is grateful for the beauty she found while practicing with her sangha at Kannon Do Zen Center in Mountain View (California). She loves spending time outdoors, subtle things in the world, and her Dharma name (Zen Breeze.) She is a member of SZBA's DEIA committee.
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