Full of compassion for the thwarted prospects of young Thai students, Phra Peter
contacted friends from his former English life and arranged for the support of some impoverished Thai students. His teacher `warned me to be cautious. He said that it was easy for a monk to become side-tracked from his own practice by the problems of the lay-people'. However, Peter went on to establish a charity, the Students' Education Trust, which grew dramatically to provide hundreds of scholarships -- leaving him with `less time for my meditation practice' and participation in chanting, thus open to criticism by senior monks and even the disapproval of some Thai lay-people: `it isn't the job of a monk in Thailand to be so actively involved in society's problems'. Finding at last that `helping disadvantaged students has become more important to me than my personal spiritual progress as a monk', he disrobed after ten years as Phra Peter.