With our deepest sympathy to the family, please join us on
Sunday, January 18, at 9 a.m., to honor and remember
Guy Devault, Dharma name Chan Thanh Son.
Please note: this is not Guy’s funeral/memorial service.
This is our regular English-speaking service
that will also include prayers and offerings in honor of Guy.
Namo A Di Da Phat
Dear members and friends of Dinh Quang Buddhist Temple,
Last night (Friday, January 9, 2026), our dear friend Guy Devault passed away. He had been at the Neighborhoods of Quail Creek for the last several months, initially recovering from a surgery to repair a broken hip. Several complications and infections first led to setbacks in his rehab, and then to his death.
Although most of our current members did not have the opportunity to know Guy well, all of us still benefit from his generous and skillful effort to practice and offer the Dharma. He was a long-time pillar of the English-speaking Buddhist community in the Ozarks. He was a member of the Order of Interbeing, as well as participating in and often hosting and guiding the local Plum Village group (called the Springfield Sangha) for many years. Many people will remember his trips to go on retreat with the Most Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh, often hitch-hiking to the retreat center and always bringing back recordings of talks and music in the days before the internet made those precious Dharma gifts more accessible.
Guy was also one of the founding members (2017) and one of the first four lay Dharma leaders of our English-speaking congregation at Dinh Quang Temple. In the days before his physical decline, he was at every service, often giving rides to those who needed one. He helped out every chance he got, from our community programs to our chanting services. He was always ready to offer wisdom and wit, often in surprising and humorous ways. Buddhist practice was a thread that ran through his life. And, even as he neared death and became unable to speak, he consistently responded to us when we read to him (Thich Nhat Hanh books remained his favorites), chanted, sang, and invited the bell.
Though we have missed his physical presence for the last several months, he remains close to our hearts. Over the next weeks, we will be chanting and making offerings in honor of Guy. Please remember him, his family, and loved ones, with gratitude and goodwill.
May the cultivation of this practice lead to the end of every kind of suffering! Namo Shakyamuni Buddha, Namo A Di Da Phat.
Memories of Guy by Teresa Myers
I first met Guy in 1993 or 1994 as one of the early members of the Springfield Sangha. At that time, we met at a building then called the United Ministries Center at a college then called SMSU. Guy introduced us curious people to the teachings of the Ven. Thich Naht Hanh. As we were from similar backgrounds, the difficult experiences described in the Venerable’s Dharma tapes reached inside me in a way many things do not. Guy never shied away from people with physical disabilities, a rare quality. He volunteered at Camp Barnabas and always was ready to lend a hand or a ride to me, a blind person, or my roommate who was also disabled. This was at a time when Guy could never have dreamed of becoming so disabled himself.
To me Guy was a great example of how an ordinary person could be an extraordinary Buddhist. He had a quirky sense of humor, even at the hardest times. He came to sangha once so exhausted he could barely move and had forgotten to bring the bell. After apologizing to us, he whacked a metal trash can and we proceeded with meditation and a Dharma talk as usual. Another time he just said “Ding.” No one laughed, and we meditated because we knew Guy was serious even when his memory was not always the best.
Guy loved music and I still remember some of the songs from retreat tapes he shared with us. He loved many things: trees, flowers, cats, the sound of the bell, his grandkids and playing with them, and cartoons. We sometimes sang old sixties songs in his truck on the way to sangha. Toward the end of his life, Guy told me it was really hard sometimes, taking a full hour just to get dressed in the morning. Yet he was at temple every time he could.
Guy had a big personality and I was privileged to know some of it. I thought of him as an older brother who gave me permission to be who I really am, whether it all fit into what others thought I should be or not. I loved him for being that kind of brother!