Pray for Peace in 2011

Pray for Peace - services are around the country. Science of Mind Church usually knows where there is a peace vigil.

Erie's Tibetan Buddhist center will host a First Light 2011 nondenominational offering of prayers for peace on New Year's Day
The hourlong service of meditation, chanting and candle lighting will begin Saturday at 7:30 a.m. at the center, 722 W. Eighth St., according to a news release.

Members will be available afterward to answer questions and share information about the center, an affiliate of the Karma Kagyu school of Tibetan Buddhism.

To learn more, call 449-1816 or e-mail juliazen02@yahoo.com.

Buddhism in Sri Lanka

The Buddhism practiced in Sri Lanka, better known as Sinhala-Buddhism (or Mahavamsa-Buddhism) is different from the Theravada Buddhism practiced in other countries such as Thailand, Cambodia and so on. The Buddhists in these countries follow only the Buddhist scriptures Tripitaka (Viniya, Sutta, Abhidhamma), whereas in Sri Lanka the 'Mahavamsa,' which was written by one of the Mahavihara monks (Ven. Mahanama) more than 1000 years after the passing away of Lord Buddha is also considered as a part of the Buddhist scriptures, although it deals mostly with mythical or supernatural Buddhist history, some episodes of which are copied from the 'Mahabaratha' and 'Ramayana.' Since the Buddhist scriptures (Tripitaka) and the mythical Buddhist history (Mahavamsa) were both written in the Pali language, a Buddhist layperson who does not understand Pali cannot understand the difference between the two and, therefore, he/she believes everything that the Buddhist monks preach, to be the true words of Buddha.

Due to ignorance, even the present day Sinhala-Buddhists still believe that they are blood relatives of Buddha because, according to the Mahavamsa, their forefather Pandu-Vasudeva belongs to the Sakya clan, and is a relative of the Buddha where as the historians believe that the term ‘Pandu’ in Pali means Pandyans.

According to Buddhism, a person ordained as a Bikkhu should practice Ahimsa (non-violence), Karuna (compassion), Metta (affection), and Maithriya (loving-kindness) towards fellow humans, (irrespective of race or religion), not only by words but also in his thoughts and action. Unfortunately in Sri Lanka, due to the influence of the Mahavamsa, a Buddhist Bikkhu is at liberty to engage in racist politics and promote Sinhala-Buddhist chauvinism and hatred, as we see today.

Protecting Buddhism

There was NO Buddhism in Sri Lanka until Emperor Asoka's missionary monks led by Mahinda converted the Hindu (Siva worshipping) Naga King Tissa into a Buddhist in the 2nd century BC. Similarly, there was NO Sinhala race/tribe in Sri Lanka until the Mahavihara monks created it in the 5th century AD. When Hindu/Brahmanical influence posed a serious challenge to Buddhism and when Buddhism started to lose popular support and the patronage from the rulers, the Buddhist institutions in India came under attack. The Mahavihara monks of Anuradapura including Ven. Mahanama, the author of the Pali chronicle Mahavamsa and a close relative of the Buddhist Naga king Dhatusena witnessed the decline and disorientation of Buddhism in India. The events that took place in India against Buddhism must have prompted the Mahavihara monks in Sri Lanka to come up with a plan/strategy to protect Buddhism. Due to their strong devotion to Buddhism and desire to consolidate and protect this religion in Sri Lanka they have decided to write the Pali chronicles Deepavamsa/Mahavamsa making Sri Lanka a Dammadeepa/Sinhaladvipa (chosen land of Buddha where Buddhism will prevail for 5000 years) and creating the Sinhala race by integrating all the Buddhists from different tribes/ethnic groups into one race and making them the sustainers of Buddhism (Gautama Buddha's chosen people) to protect Buddhism in Sri Lanka for 5000 years until the next Maithriya Buddha arrive. With the patronage of the Buddhist Kings, it is the Mahavihara monks who assimilated all the Buddhists from many different tribes together and called them Sihala (followers of Mythical Vijaya). There may have been instances where the convicted criminals from India (Bengal/Gujarat) who were exiled would have sleeked asylum in the island and would have been allowed to settle and got assimilated with the local population, but there is NO historical evidence what so ever to prove Vijaya's arrival with 700 men or to say there were Sinhalese during the Early Historic period. The term 'Sihala' itself first appeared ONLY in the 5th Century AD Pali chronicles Deepavamsa/Mahavamsa and that also ONLY twice in the beginning chapters. To date, no archaeological evidence has been found to prove ‘Hela' or 'Sihala' or ‘Sinhala' existed before that or anything about Vijaya's arrival. Only the Mahavamsa Tika that was composed very much later to interpret the Mahavamsa, mentions that it was adopted from the mysterycal ‘Vamsa texts’ known as ‘Sihala Atthakatha’ (collection of Sinhala verbal stories). Very strangely, most of the mythical/supernatural stories from the so called ‘Sihala Atthakatha Vamsa texts’ are very similar to those found in the Indian Epics and Puranas such as the Mahabaratha/Ramayana. Ultimately, the Mahavamsa has transformed the Buddha into a special patron of Sinhala-Buddhism, an ethnic religion created in Sri Lanka.

3 Imprisoned Monks

Tibetans are increasingly concerned about the fate of three senior Buddhist monks who were imprisoned following a 2008 crackdown on anti-government riots in Tibet, an overseas rights monitoring group said Wednesday.

The three were senior religious teachers at Drepung monastery in Lhasa, whose monks were at the forefront of the March 2008 protests that started out as peaceful marches before exploding into violence days later.

The U.S.-based International Campaign for Tibet said in a news release that their whereabouts remain unknown and there is growing concern among Tibetans about their welfare.

The three were listed as: Jampel Wangchuk, 55, the disciplinarian at Drepung's Loseling college, who is believed to have been given a life term; Konchok Nyima, 43, the scripture teacher at Drepung's Gomang college, sentenced to 20 years; and Ngawang Choenyi, 38, scripture teacher at Drepung's Ngakpa college, sentenced to 15 years.

The International Campaign for Tibet said the three were not believed to have taken part in the demonstrations and it was not known what crimes they had been charged with.

China frequently uses vaguely defined laws against separatism and subversion to imprison political and religious dissidents. However, the lack of a clear political connection in the three cases has raised concern that authorities are using the 2008 protests as a pretext to attack Tibetan Buddhism, the International Campaign for Tibet said.

Calls to Drepung monastery and the Lhasa police spokesman rang unanswered Wednesday. Nyima, an office director at Lhasa's bureau of ethnic and religious affairs, who like many Tibetans uses only one name, said he had no news on the three. He recorded their names and details and promised to relay any information on them.

The 2008 protests, which later spread to other Tibetan inhabited regions in western China, marked the largest uprising against Chinese rule in decades. The government says at least 22 people died in Lhasa violence. Tibetan rights groups say nearly 140 Tibetans were killed.

Authorities responded with a massive security clampdown, sending hundreds of armed police into Drepung and other monasteries and detaining an unknown number of monks and lay people. Tibet was closed to all foreign visitors for months and security remains extremely tight. Foreign journalists are required to apply for special permission to travel there and access is usually provided only through rarely scheduled government organized trips.

Beijing blamed the 2008 violence on outside agitators linked to exiled Buddhist leader the Dalai Lama">Dalai Lama, who denied any involvement. Many Tibetans remain loyal to the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize laureate and resent heavy-handed Chinese rule, including stringent controls over Buddhist monasteries and restrictions on religious practices.

China says Tibet has been part of its territory for centuries and sent troops to occupy the region following the 1949 communist seizure of power. Historians say Tibet was functionally independent for most of that time under the rule of a succession of Dalai Lama">Dalai Lamas.

European Buddhism

Guernseyman Richard Moorman became a Buddhist in 1997 but said he had been "flirting with the idea" since 1971.
He explained that in that time he had researched the faith and had been practising elements of it before his official conversion.
He said the Guernsey Buddhist Group held meetings open to anyone from any branch of Buddhism or any faith.
Richard said: "We've had Zen and Tibetan Buddhists and people of other religions come to our meetings."

He explained: "They enjoy the chanting, the meditating and the things we do."
Even though meditation is a central part of Buddhist practice Richard said it had its origins in the pre-Buddhist religions of northern India where the original Buddha was born, and today was practised by many people both as a religious activity and in secular life.
He said: "Meditation has been shown to lower blood pressure and reduce stress levels - it's a very good thing to do irrespective of the religious association...it sharpens powers of concentration."

Buddhists use beads as part of chanting and meditation
Richard decided to make the step of taking on Buddhism in an official capacity following his step-daughter's move to the faith and, along with his wife, began practising a Japanese derivation of the religion.
He explained when they converted to Buddhism they took part in "taking refuge" which involves accepting "the Buddha as your teacher, the Dharma as his teaching and the Sangha as the community of Buddhists".
Richard said Buddhists have "a profound respect for all sincere religious practice".

Using the example of Christmas he said they respected Christians and their celebration of Jesus' birth.
Richard said as he lives in a Christian culture he still celebrated the event: "It's not a religious festival for me but its certainly a time to enjoy being with family."
He said the main teaching of Buddhism is: "We don't exist in isolation to everything else, we are one with everything and everything is one with us... once that becomes a profound insight, it produces great happiness."

Chinese Premier Knows Buddhism

Berlin, Dec 19 (IANS) Leaked US diplomatic cables portray the anointed Chinese leader Xi Jinping as incorruptible, disinterested in extra marital affairs and a Communist hardliner who is 'redder than reds'.

Der Spiegel, the German magazine which reproduced the cables leaked by whistleblower web site WikiLeaks, says money seems unimportant to Xi as he apparently has enough. He likes the US and was at one time fascinated by the mysteries of Buddhism and Asian martial arts.

On Oct 18, the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party appointed 57-year-old Xi Jinping vice-president of the powerful Central Military Commission. This makes it all but certain that he will succeed Hu Jintao as Communist Party leader and Chinese president in 2012, Der Spiegel said.

The US embassy in Beijing has remarkably precise information about China's future leader. Xi is 'extremely ambitious', and a good man, according to a US source.

He also has a privileged upbringing.

Xi is the son of former guerilla fighter and later deputy prime minister Xi Zhongxun. Xi is a 'princeling', one of an influential class of sons and daughters of loyal functionaries that steadily rise up the Communist Party hierarchy under their parents' influence.

During Mao Zedong's cultural revolution Xi's father was purged and young Xi sent to the countryside.

In the early 1970s Xi and many princelings were permitted to return to Beijing. But while many of his young contemporaries set about enjoying their newfound freedom, 'he chose to survive by becoming redder than red', the US embassy's source says.

Xi realised that he could only become a career politician if he temporarily removed himself from Beijing's power clique and gathered experience in rural areas, US cables say.

He believed that his father's connections weren't enough - and that the risk of making too many enemies in the capital was too great.

He slowly worked his way up the ladder in Heibei, Fujian and Zhejiang provinces. Because Fujian faces the breakaway island of Taiwan, US dispatches say, Xi has an understanding for the plight of the Taiwanese people.

During his time in eastern China, Xi developed a fascination with the mysticism of Buddhism, the Qigong breathing technique and martial arts. It appears he also believed in supernatural forces.

In 2007 the leadership made him the Party leader in Shanghai. At the time, the Communist Party was embroiled in a corruption scandal and desperately needed a clean pair of hands. He was seen as incorruptible and as having sufficient authority to clean up the party's ranks.

Xi spent just seven months in China's financial centre before the leadership brought him to Beijing and anointed him vice president.

'Xi had promotion to the Center in mind from day one,' a US Embassy dispatch says. He is said to be a realist and a pragmatist, one who keeps his cards close to his chest before coldly playing his ace when the time is right.

Xi appears uninterested in drinking and extramarital affairs, the pursuits preferred by many high-ranking officials. Women consider him boring, a trait he shares with his stern superior, President Hu Jintao.

Xi, US cables say, knows his own country extremely well. He is well aware how corrupt many of his comrades are. He abhors the pursuit of money, much as he does China's nouveau-riche. His greatest fear is that the new, free-market era will rob people of their dignity and respect.

But he refrains from showing political initiative or promoting his own ideas, realising that such things are not good for a career within the Chinese Communist Party.

In spite of Xi's background and current position, the current Party chairman and president, Hu does not consider him his successor.

Hu's favourite for the post is Li Keqiang, whose career began in the Communist youth organization. But a group of older comrades, including former party chairman Jiang Zemin, reject their president's preferred successor.

Hu relented, and now it is thought that Li will soon replace Wen Jiabao as prime minister instead.

Xi, the winner of this power struggle, thinks little of democratic reform. He is convinced that only a small elite can maintain China's social stability and lead the country to new heights.

Buddhist Temple Fire is Political Headache

The destruction of a wooden gate in a Buddhist temple by arson, Thursday, has put a negative spin on the already chilled relations between Korean Buddhism and President Lee Myung-bak, a devoted Christian.

The fire, which reduced Cheonwangmun gate in a 1300-year-old Beomeo temple in Busan to ashes, broke out amid escalating tension between the second largest religion of the country and President Lee’s Grand National Party (GNP) following a budget cut for “templestay” programs in the process of the GNP’s railroading of next year’s state budget early this month.

It was the latest in a series of cases deepening Buddhists’ hostility against the ruling party and the government during Lee’s presidency.

Police have opened an investigation into the fire and placed a man spotted on a surveillance camera video on a wanted list since flames began to engulf the wooden gate upon his departure from the temple.

Police believe there was no political motive behind the incident. Yet, Buddhist circles seem to be trying to take advantage of the case to gain leverage in its protest against what they call “Christian-friendly” President Lee and his administration.

A group of monks held a press conference in Seoul Thursday morning, just hours after the fire was extinguished. They called for an extensive probe into the incident and condemned President Lee for his “biased” religious policies.

“The number of incidents meant to hurt the properties and value of Buddhism has surged since the Lee administration took over,” an association for young Buddhists said in a statement. “The incident came as a great surprise because it took place at a time when the entire Buddhist circle was raising voices against the ruling party’s short-sighted passage of bills regarding the templestay budget.”

Currently, all Buddhists leaders refuse to have any official meeting with those from the GNP, under the direction of Ven. Jaseung, chief executive of Jogye, the largest Buddhist order. In a statement issued last Friday, Jaseung denounce the budget reduction and urged all Buddhist leaders “not to meet with any figures from the ruling camp.”

Following the incident, the ruling camp moved first to break the deadlock.

Kim Moo-sung, floor leader of the GNP, hurriedly visited the site of the fire about 400 kilometers south of Seoul on the same day it broke out. Kim, an aide to President Lee, offered commiseration to the angered monks there and promised that his party will fully cooperate to restore the burnt structure in the first high-profile meeting between a ruling party lawmaker and a senior monk since the boycotting.

During a lunch with Ven. Jeongyeo, head of Beomeo temple, Kim apologized for the budget reduction and said his party was suffering from “a sense of guilt.”

“We have set plans to secure additional budget for the programs,” Kim told the head monk. “Please forgive us and, if necessary, berate us.”

Presidential spokesman Hong Sang-pyo also talked with the head monk over the phone and delivered President Lee’s message regarding the restoration plan.

However, Ven. Jeongyeo’s meeting with GNP leaders also drew criticism from the Jogye Order leaders who have declared that they will not meet any of GNP members.

Since Lee’s inauguration in early 2008, Buddhist groups have often clashed with his administration over its religious policies and Lee’s alleged bias as a Christian. Lee is well known as an elder of the Christian Somang church in Seoul. The conflict reached the highest level in August 2008 when tens of thousands of monks and Buddhists took to downtown Seoul to hold a massive rally against Lee’s “biased” religious policies.

China's Premier Quotes Gandhi

Visiting Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao virtually launched a charm offensive as he quoted the Upanishads, praised Mahatma Gandhi saying he has always lived in his heart and fondly remembered students calling him "grandpa" during his visit to a school here.

During his 30-minute address at the Indian Council of World Affairs, Wen also drew parallels between Chinese calligraphy and Yoga, and noted the influence of Buddhism on Chinese culture.

Recalling his visit to the Tagore International School last evening, the 68-year-old Chinese leader said he felt as if he was in his country when he was addressed as 'Grandpa Wen'.

"Children back home call me 'Grandpa Wen'," he said. "The Upanishad says 'the truth is above all and is the common foundation of conception'," the Chinese premier said as he went on the describe his "friendship" with Prime Minister Manmohan Singh.

"Prime Minister Singh and I are old friends. We have had long discussions on a dozen of occasions and forged a sincere friendship," he said.

The Chinese leader said he could see Mahatma Gandhi's unyielding image and clear eyes as he laid a wreath at the Raj Ghat memorial.

"For peace and justice, Mahatma Gandhi travelled from one village to another with firm steps, knowing no fatigue. He was intrepid, and so much so that no force or individual could make him stop," he said.

"This great man, a man of love and integrity, has always lived in my heart," Wen said.

Paying tributes to Nobel laureate Rabindranath Tagore, he said the sage poet forged a deep friendship with China's literary giants Lu Xun, Liang Qichao and Xu Zhimo.

Drawing similarities between Yoga and calligraphy, Wen said while Yogic postures signify the union of soul and physical strength, the Chinese art demonstrated the strength of hand and that of the mind.

Memorial for Fallen Warriors

NANJING, Dec. 13 (Xinhua) -- About 5,000 Chinese and foreigners gathered Monday in Nanjing, capital of east China's Jiangsu Province, to mourn hundreds of thousands of people who were killed by invading Japanese troops 73 years ago.

Participants in the ceremony stood in silent tribute, offered wreaths and bowed in front of the Memorial Hall of the Victims in the Nanjing Massacre, with sirens wailing in the drizzling morning on Monday, the 73rd anniversary of the massive slaughter.

"The Japanese soldiers invaded Nanjing when I was four, and they killed some of my family members. On the anniversary of the massacre every year I would come here to express my grief," said Sun Xuelan, a 77-year-old survivor, who is confined to a wheelchair.

Japanese troops occupied Nanjing on Dec. 13, 1937 and began a six-week massacre. Records show more than 300,000 people -- not only disarmed soldiers , but also civilians -- were killed.

Mikhalchev Mikhail, deputy director of the Central Museum of the Great Patriotic War in Russia, said, "In the history of human civilization, some facts shouldn't be forgotten, and the Nanjing Massacre was one of them."

He noted that the tragedy had become a symbol of the Chinese people's bitter suffering and prompted all people to learn the preciousness of peace."

"We should remember the history, but not hatred. Peace is a common desire of all human beings," said Nanjing citizen Yu Hong , who attended the ceremony.

Besides the memorial ceremony, Buddhist monks from China and Japan held a religious service Monday at the Memorial Hall of the Victims of the Nanjing Massacre.

The assembly was attended by 15 monks from six Buddhist temples in Japan, more than 50 monks and Buddhist believers from China and thirty Massacre survivors and relatives of victims.

The monks chanted Buddhist prayers of mourning and prayed for peace.

Aori Take Shuna, abbot of Japan's Reiunti Temple, read a poem he wrote to honor the dead and prayed for long-term friendship between the peoples of China and Japan.

Yamauchi Sayoko, who was a representative of a sect of Japanese Buddhism, said that the people of Japan, which invaded and occupied China in the 1930s and 1940s, were deeply regretful for the victims of the war and sincerely hoped such a tragedy would never be repeated.

Built in 1985, the memorial hall annually records five million visitors since it was expanded and renovated in 2007.

Zhu Chengshan, curator of the hall, said that every year when the anniversary of the Nanjing Massacre occurs , nearly 10,000 Nanjing citizens would swarm the hall and spontaneously mourn the victims.

On Sunday, workers began to extend a memorial wall at the memorial hall on which names of those killed are engraved.

After the extension, the wall would have 10,324 names, 1,724 more than three years ago, Zhu said.

Collecting the names of the victims was an important job in researching the Massacre, but it was difficult to find witnesses and documents decades later, he said.

Moreover, a group of historians from China, Japan and the United States has begun compiling an encyclopedia on the Nanjing Massacre, which was expected to embody a wide range of historical documents and pictures. "The dictionary may serve as a consolation to the deceased," Zhu said.

Tibet and the Budda

A Tibet of the mind December 2010

By: Tenzing Sonam
For the generations of Tibetans now raised in exile, ‘home’ has taken on a complex tapestry of meanings.

Like most Tibetans born and brought up in exile, I grew up, in India, with a certain idea of my homeland, one that was informed by two extreme but inseparable views. On the one hand was an idealised state of grace that existed before the Chinese invasion; on the other, the violated and transformed land – a veritable hell on Earth – that it had since become. We were taught that we, the exiles, were the keepers of the true flame of Tibet’s national identity, the guardians of its culture and traditions, which, as far as we knew, were being destroyed in our homeland. And we were also raised to believe that one day we would triumphantly return home, that the entire raison d’etre for our displacement was to fight for that moment.

Over time, this lofty aspiration lost some of its bearings, instead becoming simply another component of our lives as refugees. Our world evolved its own particular reality; we were neither Tibetans in the way that our parents were – and Tibetans in Tibet still are – in the sense of having a physical connection to our land, nor were we truly a part of our adopted countries. Our peculiar in-between lives seemed to demand the expectation of returning to our spiritual homeland for sustenance, but not necessarily its fulfilment. As far as we knew, this was our life – being an exiled Tibetan, inhabiting an ersatz Tibetan world.

For the first two decades of exile, we had very little communication with our homeland. China, then in the throes of the Cultural Revolution, was closed to the outside world, and the ensuing shroud of silence fell even more heavily over Tibet. We had no idea what had befallen our families back home, and the occasional snippet of news only confirmed our worst fears. Tibet seemed to be undergoing horrors that we could not remotely imagine; the very fabric of its existence seemed to be in the process of being dismantled. This knowledge gave us the impetus to rebuild our lives in our new home in exile. The preservation of Tibetan culture, especially its Buddhist traditions, and the development of a modern education system for the younger generation, became the Dalai Lama’s most pressing concerns. And in this, helped by India’s generous accommodation and the support of many international agencies, we proved remarkably proficient. Within a few years, we were able to create a parallel Tibetan world, complete with our own religious establishments, educational and cultural institutions, settlements and, most importantly, our own government, headquartered in Dharamsala. We became, in the words of one academic study, ‘one of the most resilient and successful refugee groups in the world’.

In the early years, however, the belief remained strong that, sooner or later, we would be returning to Tibet. For people of my father’s generation, this goal was a very real one. They retained strong memories of home, and the thought of one day being able to go back sustained them through the trauma of escape and relocation. But with each passing year, this hope became remote and unattainable. By the time my father died in a Delhi hospital, in 1999, most people of his generation had already passed away. The expectation of return thus shifted from being a credible goal to an abstract ideal. By this point, the majority of us had only ever known the state of exile as our home. Over the years, as fewer and fewer of us had any direct memory or link with Tibet, we drifted further away from the reality of its contemporary situation. Instead, we retreated deeper into the cloistered world we had created for ourselves, an alter-Tibetan universe that was validated by the existence of the Tibetan government-in-exile and the various religious, educational and cultural institutions we had established. But above all, it was the presence of the Dalai Lama that gave us a kind of moral justification, a redeeming reason for our continuing existence as refugees.

Buddhist Thinker

Dr Ruwan M Jayatunge
The Buddha’s Charter of Free Inquiry and judging truth are found in the Kalama Sutra of the Anguttara Nikaya. In Kalama Sutra Buddha emphasized the importance of critical thinking that involves seeing things in an open-minded way. Critical thinking helps to evaluate and challenge the thoughts and ideas and rethink conclusions in the light of new knowledge.

Buddhism was conceived as a rational way of thought, being entirely in accordance with the latest findings of the natural sciences and Buddhism was not based on ‘dogmas of blind belief and revelation, but on rational thought and experiential examination. (Martin Baumann – Global Buddhism: developmental periods, regional histories, and a new analytical perspective – Journal of Global Buddhism 2001)

Critical Thinking

In 1987, Michael Scriven & Richard Paul gave a detailed description on Critical Thinking. According to Michael Scriven & Richard Paul Critical thinking is the intellectually disciplined process of actively and skillfully conceptualizing, applying, analyzing, synthesizing, and/or evaluating information gathered from, or generated by, observation, experience, reflection, reasoning, or communication, as a guide to belief and action. In its exemplary form, it is based on universal intellectual values that transcend subject matter divisions: clarity, accuracy, precision, consistency, relevance, sound evidence, good reasons, depth, breadth, and fairness. It entails the examination of those structures or elements of thought implicit in all reasoning: purpose, problem, or question-at-issue; assumptions; concepts; empirical grounding; reasoning leading to conclusions; implications and consequences; objections from alternative viewpoints; and frame of reference. Critical thinking — in being responsive to variable subject matter, issues, and purposes — is incorporated in a family of interwoven modes of thinking, among them: scientific thinking, mathematical thinking, historical thinking, anthropological thinking, economic thinking, moral thinking, and philosophical thinking.

Gautam Buddha from Lumbini

Gautam Buddha was born in Lumbini in the 6th century BC in mid Tarai, Nepal. Nepal has been a pious and holy land for all Buddhists as well as all kinds of religious men and women. Buddha has guided human society on the path of peace, non-violence and prosperous thinking. Gautam Buddha meditated at Sarnath-Banarash and acquired the Light of Knowledge (Mokchya) under the holy fig-tree at Gaya, which is now called Buddha Gaya.

A Nepalese scholar Rupesh Shrestha writes-The term Buddha means “Enlightened One”, and signifies that the person to whom it is applied has solved the riddle of existence, and discovered the doctrine for the cessation of misery. Lord Buddha propounded Hinayana, a simple religion in which he followed to a large extent. This was a direct and simple philosophy that appealed to the masses.

Geographically, historically and politically, Nepal occupies a position in between two great empires of India and China and has drunk deeply from the two culturally rich springs, drawing inspirations from both its grand neighbors, as the political current ebbed or flowed - an influence clearly illustrated in the building styles of Nepal. In addition, there is the religious, cultural and philosophical effect of that great tide of Buddhism, which swept through the continent of Asia.

The descriptions of famous ancient Chinese pilgrims, Huian Tsang (who traveled through India between AD 629 & 645) and Fa Hein (who traveled between AD 400 & AD 414) indicate to this area, saying, 'Lumbini, where the Lord was born, is a piece of heaven on earth where one could see the snowy mountains amidst a splendid garden embedded with Stupas and monasteries.'

An English writer H.A. Oldfield has written- There are about 2000 Buddhist Shrines in the Kathmandu Valley.The majority of those are Chaityas. The Buddhist of Nepal has been adopting several Hindu deities as part of the religious behavior. I have included the opinions of many researchers as Ram Kumar Shrestha, Min Bahadur Shakya, V.K Manandhar, Shanker Thapa, Dr. Tilak Shrestha and others

DR. Tilak Shrestha writes-'The ethnic politics and Dharmic ignorance create non-existing problems. In the given setup, to assign Bahun, Pradhan and Kirati traditions into Hindu camp and Tuladhar, Bajracharya, Shakya, Sherpas & Tamang, Some Gurungs, Magars, Tharus, traditions into Buddhist camp is the outcome of serious comedy. Shaiva and Bauddha Religion are very similar emphasizing knowledge and meditation.The difference is that Shaiva begins with the assumption of ‘Brahma’ as the ultimate reality. The world as we know is one of its manifestations. Bauddha remains empirical and makes no assumptions. Though the goal is to go beyond emancipation, the discipline is within the direct understanding and experience of an individual in the world as it is. For Baudha Dharma the ‘Bodhi’ (Brahma) is the result of the empirical finding, not a priori. One of the philosophers of the middle age Shankaracharya was an Adwaita (Non-duel) scholar and debated mainly with Mimamsa school of Darshan. He also debated with Jaina, Shaiva and Baudha scholars. While Shankaracharya is given credit for the defeat of Buddhism in Hindu literature, he was in fact active after Buddhism had almost entirely faded from prominence. In particular, he was not a contemporary of the last great Indian Buddhist philosopher, Dharmakirti.

When Shankara came north to the intellectual centers there, he borrowed many of the ideas that had been formulated by Buddhist philosophers of the past. (external link)” The unity of the three principal Dharmas of Hinduism in Nepal – Buddhism (Buddha), Shaiva (Nilkantha) and Vaishnav (Narayan) is beautifully given in the temple located in Kathmandu valley, which we lovingly call – ‘Budha Nilkantha Narayan.’ The great contribution for the spread of Buddhism with definition of homely environment and Vikshus (begging alms) disseminated Buddhism was made by Shankaracharya. The opinion, doctrine and ethics strengthened Buddhism. Thus, Shankaracharya was not averse to real Buddhism.

Due to the Nepalese princess Brikuti who married with the King of China- the famous Shronchan Gompo, speeded the Buddhism and the craftsman Araniko who built numerous famous Buddhist statues in China and Tibet. From the time of Shronchan Gompo, Buddhism became gradually popular in China and Mongolia.

Medieval China learned and gained the Buddhism- 'the way of peaceful life.' Fa-xian, a famous monk visited the Buddha's birth place. His account on Lumbini -'Record of Buddhist Kingdom.' is applied as a useful historical asset. A Chinese scholar-Xuan-zhang visited 636 Kapilvastu and his traveling accounts are known as historical knowledge's. Lumbini, the holy pilgrimage had and has been attracting the Chinese monks to visit. The reality is that the Chinese monks contributed to preach Buddhism in China, India, south Asia Burma, Shilanka, Afhaganistan and the western world also. The monks preached translating the Sanskrit sermons of the Buddhism.The Tibetan Buddhism was developed as the most influential Buddhist heritage. Nepal and China have a long history of cultural relations.

In 1895, a German Archaeologist- Dr. A. Fuhrer, An Indian Dr. Mukargee and Nepalese Khadga Shamshere discovered the missing pillar which was set up by the Maurya emperor of India, Ashoka where Gautam Buddha was born-the most visible landmark of the Sacred Garden.The historic importance of the pillar is evidenced by the inscription engraved in the pillar (in Brahmi script).From excavations it has been found that the Ashokan pillar stands on its original base of unborn brick platform which concludes that the Pillar is at its original location.

900 Year Tradition

“The 17th Karmapa is the oldest and the most revered reincarnate lineage in Tibetan Buddhism,” Samdhong Rinpoche told AsiaNews. The Kalon Tripa or prime minister of the Tibetan government-in-exile spoke a few days before the 900th anniversary of the Karmapa, the third highest spiritual office in Tibetan Buddhism after the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama. The current incarnation has lived in India since 2000, free from Chinese control. He is viewed as the “natural” successor to the Dalai Lama.
Born in 1983, the current Karmapa Lama (Trinley Thaye Dorje) fled from Tsurphu Temple in central Tibet and after an overland winter trek across the Himalayas, he reached India where he was given asylum.

He has lived in Dharamsala since he went into exile. He is free to travel but requires official permission to receive visitors.

For Rinpoche, 900 years “of Karma tradition are significant because it is an occasion to strengthen and reinforce the Tibetan religious and cultural identity”.

Here is the interview Samdhong Rinpoche gave AsiaNews.

Why is the Indian Government keeping the Karmapa under such stringent restrictions? He was allowed to leave India only once, in 2008 when permission was finally given for him to visit the US.

The Indian Government is providing security and protection to the Karmapa, especially because since he was eight-year-old when he became the first reincarnation to be recognised by both the Dalai Lama and the Chinese government. Importantly, in the absence of the Dalai Lama and the Panchen Lama, China wants to make use of him for their own purposes. Thus, the Indian government is kindly protecting him.

Why is China afraid of the Karmapa?

China considers Buddhist religion and culture as synonymous with the Tibetan identity. Hence, all spiritual activity, growth, and prosperity make Chinese officials unhappy, nervous and afraid especially as he was recognised by the PRC.

What is the core teaching of the Karmapa?

The Karmapa is a disciple of the Dalai Lama and for the past ten years, he has received his teaching. In keeping with his teachings, the Karmapa is promoting care for the environment and spiritual harmony among other teachings. With the rumoured retirement of the Dalai Lama, the Karmapa will take on additional responsibilities. The Dalai may retire from temporal leadership so that the Tibetan government will take care of administrative governance. This will not involve any change in functioning.

The first Karmapa appeared 900 years ago. What is the most important aspect of this celebration?

Nine hundred years of Karma tradition are significant because this is an occasion to strengthen and reinforce the Tibetan religious and cultural identity in the heart of every Tibetan, anywhere in the world. A two-day ceremony to mark the 900th anniversary of the Karmapa lineage will be held in Bodh Gaya, India, on 8 December. (N.C.)

Dalai Lama Teaches Russian Monks

Dharamsala, November 30: His Holiness the Dalai Lama on Tuesday began a three-day Buddhist teaching at the Main Tibetan Temple (Tsuglagkhang) here at the request of a Buddhist group from Russia.

Over 1000 Russian Buddhists and, hundreds of Tibetans and visiting tourists packed the Tsuglagkhang Temple to listen to the teachings of the Dalai Lama on Gyalsey Thokme Sangpo's "37 Practices of A Boddhisattva" (laklen sodunma)from November 30 to December 2. Along with the teachings, the Dalai Lama will also confer a Guhyasamaja Initiation.

The teaching has been specially considered by the Dalai Lama for the Buddhists from Russia and the Russian Republics of Buryatia, Kalmykia and Tuva. A small group of followers from Mongolia are also attending the teachings.

The Dalai Lama is revered by the Mongolian and Russian Buddhists as their spiritual leader and they continue to seek His Holiness’ blessing and guidance for the full revival of Buddhism in their regions after undergoing decades of severe repression from Communist rule.

"There has been a growing interest to learn and understand Buddhism in the three Buddhists Republics and also in the rest of mainland Russia," Telo Rinpoche, the spiritual head of Kalmyk Buddhists and the man responsible for organising the teachings, told Phayul.com.

"So compared to last year's teachings, when we have around 800 attendees, this time we have around 1035 people coming from Russia. Also this times there are more youngsters joining their family to hear teachings from His Holiness," he added.

"We have also seen more and more people from Russia coming to India every year to visit the holy Buddhist places and also to learn Buddhism," Telo added.

Despite decades of Soviet repression, Buddhism survived in the Buddhist Republics of Russia and is now being revived. Mongolia, a predominantly Buddhist state, too suffered cultural obliteration at the hand of communism.

"So what is even more encouraging is that His Holiness has already given his kind consideration to give teachings for us again next year," Telo Rinpoche said.

Telo also said many of the Buddhist faithful attending the teachings have plans to stay little longer in Dharamsala, the exile home of Dalai Lama and the seat of Tibetan Government-in-Exile, or spend more time in India visiting other holy Buddhist places.

Among those attending the three-day teachings are former prime minister of Kalmyk Republic, three members of Russian Parliament (Duma) and the finance minister and other dignitaries from Kazakhstan, Telo confirmed.

There is also a strong media delegation of 27 journalists from different Russian news media currently in Dharamsala, the seat of Tibet's government in exile in north India. While in the town, they will explore the situation of the exile Tibetan community that includes interviews with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan prime minister and senior officials, and various other representatives from the community.

Information available with the organisers of the teachings shows more than 4000 enthusiasts from 54 different countries have registered for the teachings.

The teachings are scheduled to be held in the morning from 0900hrs to 1130hrs in the morning and 1300hrs to 1500hrs in the afternoon for the next two days.

These teachings are being translated in Russian. Simultaneous translations in English and Chinese are also made available on FM radio.

New Religious Book

Energion Publications announces the January 3, 2011 release of a new book, Ephesians: A Participatory Study Guide. Following the outlines of the Participatory Study Method, Dr. Robert Cornwall presents a study guide to the book of Ephesians that is both usable and challenging while not skirting the difficult issues. These eight lessons take you through this letter to the Ephesians leading from the history and background to modern application and sharing in corporate study and worship.

Whether you are approaching this book as an individual, as a small group, or in a larger classroom setting, this study guide (http://energionpubs.com/books/1893729842/) will provide you with direction, exercises, and questions for discussion and further investigation.

Chanting Competition from Budda

GUANGZHOU, China — Off court they are calm and meditative but once in front of crowds chanting 'kabaddi, kabaddi, kabaddi', they only want to win.
Three of the 14 members of Japan's kabaddi team at the Asian Games are reportedly monks, while five others have graduated from a Zen Buddhist institute.
"Training in kabaddi makes our bodies stronger and healthier, while Buddhism meets our spiritual needs," the Beijing Daily quoted Japan's team leader Kokei Ito as saying.
"There is no conflict between sports and faith."
Born in 1978, Ito has been training in kabaddi since he was 18, following in the footsteps of his elder brother who participated in the sport at the Beijing Asian Games and is currently an official with Japan's delegation.
Japan lost to kabaddi powerhouse Pakistan on Tuesday 40-24 in round two play, but is still hoping to reach the podium and win the country's first-ever medal in the sport.
Kabaddi involves teams of men joining hands, holding their breath and raiding opponents.

Buddhism Old in Tibet

Dharamshala: A presentation by Mr Gabriel Lafitte, an Australian academic and development policy consultant to the Environment and Development Desk (EDD) of the Tibetan Government-in-Exile was held in Dharamsala, northern India, on Monday (Nov 22). Entitled China's innermost Secret Fears, the talk was organised by the Tibetan Women's Association and attended by 30 Tibetans and foreign tourists, who took part in a question-and-answer session.
Mr Lafitte told the audience that on November 1 repressive new regulations intruding into management of Tibetan monasteries came into force. These were denounced by Kalon Tsering Phuntsok as "an evil design on the part of the Chinese government to obstruct Buddhist teachings and its sacred transmissions inside Tibet, and makes it extremely difficult for monastic institutions to undertake their important religious activities".

Paradoxically, a leading academic analyst of Chinese policy wrote the following about the new regulations: "China's new religious policy expands the institutional autonomy of religious organizations, limits the power of religious affairs bureaus, and provides for administrative appeal, judicial challenge, and sanctioning errant officials...

"We thus view the new religious policy as an effort by the Chinese government to fold the management of religion into its larger systemic reform portfolio, to synchronize an anachronistic policy, and to integrate religious policy that diverges from its systemic socioeconomic and political reforms."

What sense can be made of this contradiction? The most common exile response is to say the Chinese leaders are liars and atheists, with no business interfering in what they cannot possibly comprehend. The Kalon Tripa (Tibetan Prime Minister) said that the People's Republic of China, which claims itself to be officially an atheist state, cannot have the authority to formulate rules and regulations on the management of religious affairs of Tibetan Buddhism.

But the contradictions go deeper

Why do China's leaders insist they must oppress Tibet? There are many obvious answers to this most basic of questions, yet none of the usual answers get to the heart of China's fear and loathing of Tibetan culture, especially its leaders' hatred of Tibetan religion. People say it is because the Chinese are communists and communists hate religion, as if nothing in China has changed since Mao told the Dalai Lama in 1954 that religion is poison. Now the Communist Party is barely communist in its ideology, but the ferocious antagonism to Tibetan culture continues. We cannot create dialogue with China's elite until we understand what drives that negative attitude. So we need first to clarify our own thinking. We can do this by looking back at the past century of China's violent struggles to achieve modernity, discovering deep hostility to institutional religion throughout.

If it is not communism but modernity that is the antagonist of Tibetan Buddhism, in the eyes of China's elite, then we can identify the core problem, and stop blaming communism. One reason the world is not listening to Tibetans, though it used to listen not so long ago, is that Tibetans continue to name communism as the enemy, and those who deal with China every day see little sign of communism.

Once we identify China's total determination to attain complete modernity as the reason why Tibetan culture has to be repressed - and Tibetan language removed from the classroom - we know what we are up against. China's quest for modernity is older and deeper than communism. The Kuomintang (Chinese Nationalist Party) was just as committed as the Communist Party to strictly controlling religion, because it holds back modernity and a strong state.

How did it come about that modernity sees public religion as its enemy? What are the origins of this antagonism? Can religion play a constructive role in public debate and policy, without being a hindrance to modernity? When Kalon Tripa Samdhong Rinpoche once said he was anti-modern, did he mean he wanted to go backwards, or further forward, beyond the limitations and materialist obsessions of modernity?

Japan, like China, was suddenly faced with the challenge of modernity but took a different path, and now manages to be both modern, developed, prosperous and entirely Japanese. Why is the Chinese path to modernity more violent, contradictory, repressive, fragile and fearful of collapsing into chaos?

The fundamental question is: How did it come about that the project of creating a modern society, of literate, productive individuals, made religion into its enemy? To answer this we must go beyond China and Japan, to Europe, to discover assumptions inherited by Asian modernisers. We must look at the European invention of modernity, as a new way of understanding the purpose of human life, a new set of assumptions about the sources of human happiness. We must look at the great revolutions in France and Russia - violent attempts at attaining modernity as fast as possible.

Modernity is much more than railways and bridges, power stations and skyscrapers. It is a mindset, an aggregation of assumptions that have become naturalised and no longer visible.

In the modernist world view, religion can be reduced to being merely an expression of psychological and social needs. The inner legitimacy and inner subjective experience of religious practice is denied and obscured. Instead an aloof, distant, objective, scientific stance is taken, in which religion can be explained by the sciences of sociology and psychology, as the yearnings of people for happiness, which has sedimented over time into specific practices. Religion is no more than its observable practices, and those practices do not promote rational productivity, so at best they are useless and at worst are obstacles to the creation of a new focus for the aspirations and yearnings of the masses - i.e. the nation-state.

All of the above were core beliefs of not only the Communist Party of China but also the Kuomintang; and of the Kemalist revolutionaries of Turkey, the PRI revolutionary regime in Mexico, Soviet Russia and revolutionary France.

James Tong, political science professor at the University of California and close observer of China has expressed the hope that: "Once the modernizing state has consolidated its power, state-religion relations may evolve from competitive conflict to accommodative cooperation." This is a similar optimism to regular hopes expressed by the Dalai Lama - that as China matures it can relax and become more tolerant. It is the hope that modernity is not an endless, all-embracing project, forever requiring the exclusive loyalty and energy of all citizens - that at a certain point China can feel confident it has attained modernity, has at last caught up with the leading developed countries, can stand among the great nations as an equal, and no longer needs to prove anything.

But is modernity a destination, and an attainable one which is known to have been attained when it arrives?

Above all, the party-state clearly does not feel it has 'consolidated its power' in Tibet. In fact, it reads the unhappiness of the Tibetan people, so obvious since early 2008, as a clear sign that it has yet to consolidate the power of the modern nation-state and must crush the disloyal Buddhists ever more fiercely. Elsewhere in China, modernity is flowering and maturing, but in Tibet the modernity project remains at a preliminary and tenuous stage, and might collapse altogether if tight control is relaxed. So Professor Tong may be right about other parts of China, where the modern state may be willing to curb the harsh and arbitrary powers of the official religious bureaus - but not in Tibet, where their obnoxious intrusions into the realm of the transcendental is as zealous as ever.

This is not an academic debate about vague terms like modernity, religion, superstition and the nation-state. We need to understand what drives the antagonism. Why is it that the Communist Party remains locked in seeing the Tibetan monasteries as a seriously threatening enemy? Until we understand how this has happened, we cannot say we have found a language in which any future negotiations may begin. Until we acknowledge the roots of China's fears, it is a dialogue of the deaf, on all sides.

But are there ways in which this conflict can be reframed? Modernity's foundational assumption is that religion is an irrational yearning for security in an unpredictable natural world where the forces of nature are untamed, and that the modern alternative, of conquering nature, can successfully replace irrational yearnings with rational productivity guided by a strong state.

In vain do religious practitioners protest that the modernizers know nothing about the true purpose and practice of Buddhism. But what if Buddhism could demonstrate it is actually rational and scientific?

This is where, as usual, His Holiness the Dalai Lama has been way ahead of everyone. He has pioneered a dialogue with neuroscientists, over a long period, and given much of his precious time to it, even when many of the scientists seemed to have little to offer. Yet he persists to this day in the collaborative rediscovery of Buddhist logic, philosophy, epistemology and ontology as rational - long predating the insights of 20th century physics and quantum mechanics, and 21st century neuroscience.

His Holiness, while unafraid to drop old metaphors such as the earth being flat, has not sought to change Buddhism, as Vivekananda and Ramana Maharshi more radically repackaged Hinduism to accommodate modernity. Buddhism has not changed, but it is open to science.

New Buddha Center for Germany

Berlin, Nov 19 (DPA) Europe's largest Buddhist centre has got the go-ahead for a site at a former military complex outside Cologne, it was confirmed Friday.

The complex will house 60-80 monks plus up to 200 guests.

There are already 20 Buddhist monks and nuns living on the site in Waldbroel, 50 km east of Cologne.

The 10-million euro ($14-million) project, by the European Institute of Applied Buddhism, is to provide seminars and courses, teaching strategies to deal with issues such as conflict, anger or grief.

The centre is expected to open in 2015.

The European Institute of Applied Buddhism was set up by a Buddhist monk, Thich Nhat Hanh, who was banished from Vietnam in 1966. Alongside the Dalai Lama, he is one of the most recognized contemporary Buddhists, and has tens of thousands of followers.

Dalai Lama Welcomes Release of Suu Kyi

Dharamshala: Hailing the release of Aung San Suu Kyi, Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama today extended solidarity to the movement for democracy in Myanmar and hoped that China will free fellow Nobel peace laureate Liu Xiaobo and other "prisoners of conscience".

Suu Kyi, the 65-year-old Nobel Peace Prize winner and pro-democracy leader, was freed from detention yesterday by Myanmar's military government.

"I welcome the release of Aung San Suu Kyi and extend my appreciation to the military regime in Burma. I extend my full support and solidarity to the movement for democracy there and take this opportunity to appeal to freedom-loving people all over the world to support such non-violent movements," Dalai Lama said in a message from Japan communicateed by the office of the Dalai Lama in Dharamsala.

Cambodian Buddhism Book

CAMBODIAN BUDDHISM: Ian Harris; Munshiram Manoharlal Publishers Pvt. Ltd., 54, Rani Jhansi Road, New Delhi-110055. Rs. 1095.

Much of the source material available on Cambodian Buddhism is in French. This is understandable, given that France was Cambodia's colonial power. What is available in English is only scanty. This book is an attempt to fill this gap. In a chronological order, it traces the development of Theravada Buddhism before the arrival of the French, and then the politicised Buddhism, which had its beginnings in the middle of the 19th century. That the author, Ian Harris, has made extensive research into the primary as well as secondary sources stands out clearly from the work.

Evidences

In the first chapter, Harris discusses the place of Buddhism in Cambodia's history from the period of Funan to Angkor, citing epigraphic, art historical, and other documentary evidences. Although it is difficult to establish precisely when Buddhism arrived in Cambodia, the standing Buddha in varamudra and the images of the Buddha in parinirvana point to its existence from ancient times.

While the factors that led to the development of Theravada Buddhism following the fall of Angkorian power are dealt with in the second chapter, the next two chapters are devoted to a detailed study of its various aspects. The death of King Ang Duang marked the end of the middle period and the beginning of the modern, with unexpected influences. The way the pre-modern Khmer interpreted their environment from the physical and mythological perspectives is also explained. In the modern context, Thailand, which signifies orthodox Theravada values, influenced Cambodian Buddhism.

Dalai Lama Lecture in Delhi

Report by Arvind Sharma; Dharamsala: Tibetan spiritual leader The Dalai Lama will attend the leaders summit of HindustanTimes being organized at Delhi on 19 and 20th nov, said a spokes person of the Tibetan government in exile at Dharamsala. Dalai Lama will speak on The Art of Happiness in Troubled Times on 19th October, and He shall be the 1st speaker of the summit.

Dr. Kenneth Lieberthal, Senior Fellow, Foreign Policy Studies, The Brookings Institution, Prof. Yasheng Huang, Professor of International Management, MIT Sloan School of Management and Prof. Richard Rigby, Executive Director, The ANU China Institute, Australian National University, shall speak on the topic of The Rise and Rise of China : What It Means for India, on the last day of summit, he said

He said that this meet shall also be attended by Indian PM Dr. Manmohan Singh , opposition leader Arun Jaitley, cricketer Wasim Akram and film personalities like Rishi Kapoor and Ranbir Kapoor. He said that 26 fomous leaders of India and abroad shall be attending the 2 days summit with a theme of winning in testing times.

The leaders summits of the yester years were attended by the leaders like Atal Bihari Bachpai, Late Benazir Bhutto,John Major,Sonia Gandhi,Mukesh Ambani,Omar Abdullah,William.S Cohen, Shahrukh Khan, Narender Modi,Aslf Ali Zardariand George Bush.

Tibetan Group Gets Support

The Sixth International Conference of Tibet Support Groups was held at Surajkund in the north Indian state of Haryana from 5 to 7 November 2010. It was convened by the Core Group for Tibetan Cause - India, the apex coordinating body of the Tibet supporters in India, and facilitated by the Department of Information & International Relations of the Central Tibetan Administration.

The conference was attended by 258 participants from 57 countries and consisted of an opening ceremony, five plenary sessions and working groups on political support, outreach to Chinese, human rights, and environment and development issues.

During the inaugural ceremony, His Holiness the Dalai Lama was the Guest of Honour and the former Deputy Prime Minister of India, Mr. Lal Krishna Advani, the Chief Guest, while the Kalon Tripa, Prof Samdhong Rinpoche, delivered the key note address.

Other international guests present at the inaugural ceremony included Senator Miriam Defensor Santiago from the Phillippines; Mr Rafael Gimalov, Member of Parliament from Russia; Major (Retd.), Vijay Singh Mankotia, former Minister of Himachal Pradesh in India; Mr. Javed Raza, National General Secretary, Janata Dal (United), India; Dr. Yang Jianli, President of Initiatives for China, T.N. Chaturvedi, former governor of Karnataka; Subhash Kashyap, former Secretary-General of the Indian Parliament; and Ms. Jaya Jaitly, a prominent socialist leader.

The purpose of the conference was to take stock of efforts in finding a negotiated solution to the Tibetan issue, discuss the current situation in Tibet and outline ways for the Tibet groups throughout the world, including Tibetan NGOs and Tibetan associations, to strengthen their work in the light of new developments in China and Tibet.

The previous conferences of Tibet Support Groups have been held in Dharamsala in 1990, in Bonn in 1996, Berlin in 2000, Prague in 2003, and Brussels in 2007. A special TSG conference was also held in India in 2008.

The conference participants:

Reiterated their position that His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Central Tibetan Administration are the legitimate representatives of the Tibetan people;

Expressed their deep admiration for the unwavering determination and commitment to nonviolence of the Tibetans in Tibet despite the increasingly stringent controls being exercised by the Chinese authorities;

Recalled the courage of the Tibetan people who voiced their grievances and expressed their aspirations through public demonstrations throughout Tibet in 2008;

Demanded that the Chinese Government let the world know the whereabouts of the Panchen Lama and release him as well as all Tibetan political prisoners;

Expressed their appreciation to His Holiness the Dalai Lama and Kalon Tripa Samdhong Rinpoche, whose addresses during the inaugural session have greatly motivated the participants. The conference expresses its appreciation of Kalon Tripa’s many years of leadership and assistance to the TSGs;

Welcomed the reiteration by Indian leader Lal Krishna Advani at the conference of the Indian support to Tibetan aspirations irrespective of how the India-China relationship develops;



Applauded the extraordinary and continued support rendered by the government and the people of India to the Tibetan people, which has enabled them to establish a firm foundation for the preservation and promotion of Tibetan identity in exile;

Committed to work together to forge a strong international coalition that will pursue a common strategy for alleviating the plight of the people of Tibet and ensuring a political solution to the Tibetan issue, consistent with their United Nations recognised right to self-determination;

Welcomed the increased participation by Chinese delegates in the conference and regarded this as a measure of the growing understanding and support among the Chinese people about the reality of the Tibetan people and the Chinese people’s future role towards creating a solution;

Welcomed the noticeable increase in delegates from Southeast Asia;

Welcomed the democratic election process that is currently underway to elect the Kalon Tripa (Prime Minister) and members of the Tibetan Parliament by Tibetans in the free world. We fully support the International Network of Parliamentarians for Tibet’s initiative to facilitate and ensure that international election observers are invited to monitor the Tibetan election process in Nepal. We remain particularly concerned about Nepalese authorities’ interference in the Tibetan election process in October 2010. We urge the Nepalese Government to respect the Tibetan people’s right to participate in their democratic process;

Appreciated the sympathy and support of the people and Government of Nepal towards the humanitarian needs of the Tibetans-in-exile so far, as well as, expressed serious concern about the changing attitude of the Government of Nepal towards the Tibetan refugees in recent times;

Expressed condemnation of China's continued abuse of the human rights of the Tibetan people in general, including its violation of China's own constitutionally-mandated rights, its violation of international treaty obligations concerning the Tibetan people's religious and monastic administration, and its violation of the Tibetan people’s rights to use the Tibetan language as the medium of instruction in the education system. The Tibet Support Groups resolved to closely monitor the situation and develop appropriate actions to highlight these abuses and make China respect these rights;

Expressed concern that the People's Republic of China's ill-conceived developmental activities in Tibet are negatively affecting the fragile ecology with grave implications for the region and the world as a whole and demanded that these activities be stopped forthwith;

Resolved to make the protection of the Tibetan environment a central part of campaign work for the coming years;

Urged the governments of conference participants, as well as the United Nations and other international agencies, to recognise His Holiness the Dalai Lama and the Tibetan Government-in-Exile as the legitimate representatives of the Tibetan people and take tangible action towards a political solution in Tibet, reminded the governments and parliaments, including the European parliament, of their past commitments to support Tibet and urged them to take effective steps to fulfill them;

Sunday Services

Congregation Beth Israel, 1336 Hemlock St.: Rabbi Julie Danan will speak on the Torah portion, Lech Lecha; 10 a.m.
Our Divine Savior Catholic Church, 566 E. Lassen Ave.: Mass; 5 p.m. Scripture: Exodus 17:8-13, Psalm 121:1-8; 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2, Luke 18:1-8.
Seventh-day Adventist Church, 1877 Hooker Oak Ave.: "Into the Deep Scripture," from Pastor Jonny Hayasaka, youth pastor; 10:50 a.m.
St. Cyril and Methodius Orthodox Church (SCA), 2956 Cohasset Road: Vespers; 6 p.m. The Rev. Michael Spainhoward, presider.
St. John the Baptist Catholic Church, 416 Chestnut St.: Vigil Mass; 5:30 p.m. Scripture: Exodus 17:8-13, Psalm 121:1-8; 2 Timothy 3:14-4:2, Luke 18:1-18.
St. Catherine of Siena Parish: Mass; 10 a.m. Call 343-1311 for location.
Paradise service today:
St. Thomas More Catholic Church, 767 Elliott Road: Mass; 8:30 a.m. Vigil for Sunday Mass; 5 p.m. The Rev. Steven Foppiano, presider.
Chico Sunday services:
Aldersgate United Methodist Church, 2869 Cohasset Road: "Five Practices for Fruitful Christians," from Pastor Neal Neuenburg; 9 a.m. contemporary and 11 a.m. traditional.
Bidwell Presbyterian Church, 208 W. First St.: "Healing Agents," part 5, from Pastor Steve Schibsted's series, "The Church Unleashed"; 8:30 a.m. traditional, 9:45 and 11:11 a.m. contemporary and 5:45 p.m. alternative. Scripture: Acts 3:1-10.

Budda Teach in Knoxville

Lama Jamdron, teacher, translator, and personal secretary at Kagyu Thubten Chöling Monastery in Wappingers Falls, N.Y., will be teaching Nov. 12-13 at Losel Shedrup Ling of Knoxville, 5415-F Kingston Pike.

From 7-9 p.m., Friday, Nov. 12, he will present "A Little Shift Makes a Big Difference," during which he will discuss the many small but profound ways we can bring insight into our mundane tasks and relationships, so that every day can become a forward step on the path to freedom.

From 9:30-11:30 a.m., Saturday, Nov. 13, he will present "Making Sense of the Vajrayana," during which he will discuss the esoteric practices of Tibetan Buddhist Tantra. Referred to as the quick path to enlightenment, tantric practices are deeply skillful means that can bring about a complete transformation of our experience, but western practitioners may have difficulty understanding how to relate to them. Lama Jamdron will give practical advice about how to engage in Vajrayana meditation in a way that is personally meaningful.

From 1:30 pm-4:30 p.m., Saturday, Nov. 13, he will present "Discovering No-Self Without Losing Your Head," during which he will discuss the Buddha teaching that ultimately we have no truly existent self. When properly understood and realized, "the truth of selflessness" brings freedom from suffering and confusion. But this teaching can also be misunderstood as a dictum to negate or suppress the ego in the relative world. Lama Jamdron will teach the methods of insight meditation that can lead to right understanding of the view of selflessness, and discuss how to avoid misconceptions about this fundamental principle.

Space is limited, so please register in advance. LSLK has a limited number of cushions and chairs, so please bring your own cushion if you have one.

The suggested donation is $30 for both days, or $15 per session. Direct offerings to Lama Jamdron are encouraged. Donations to LSLK are also welcome.

For info and to register, visit http://www.lslk.org.

Toronto Meditation with the Dalai Lama

A congregation of more than 5,000 people has gathered in a former lighting warehouse in Etobicoke, on the outskirts of Toronto. The floor is concrete. The corrugated-metal ceiling is low. The mood is wet.

At the far end stands a glittering altar of three enormous, golden Buddhas, with a throne and a gentle sea of monks at its foot. The 14th Dalai Lama, leader of Tibetan Buddhism and of the Tibetan government in exile and a 75-year-old celebrity of spiritual and political proportions, has yet to part a velvety curtain.
What pilgrimage to enlightenment is supposed to be comfortable? This one, to the Tibetan Canadian Cultural Centre, feels like an unfortunate trip to the mall. At this point, anyway.

I arrived at 7:30 on a Sunday morning to a hive of yellow-jacketed police officers waving hands at congested traffic in the low light. Parking arrangements were unclear. It was pouring. Long, snaking lineups of e-ticket holders stood in the rain to get a proper security pass from volunteers under tents. My cheap Burberry-knock-off umbrella collapsed. A sign to renounce trendy material trappings?

“Please be patient,” a volunteer exhorted through a megaphone. After receiving the tickets, we have to go through another long line in the rain to pass through metal detectors. “When you get inside, you’re gonna be very happy!” he exclaimed. A ripple of fleeting smiles swept through the masses.

The crowd is composed mostly of Tibetan Canadians, many of the women in long dresses, tiptoeing gingerly over puddles in open-toed sandals. The rest possess an alternative vibe: flowing clothes, dreadlocks, long hair, Birkenstock sandals. Not a pair of chinos in sight.

China Talking Tibet and Buddha Again

Learn about saving energy from the experts. Enterprise wide savings! schneider-electric.com
The heads of the schools of Tibetan Buddhism and the Central Tibetan Administration's Department of Religion and Culture in Dharamsala rejected a regulation imposed by the Chinese Government that aimed at undermining Tibet's traditional Buddhist culture.

The State Administration for Religious Affairs (SARA) of the People's Republic of China, issued a circular called the 'Regulation on the administration of Tibetan Buddhist Monasteries or Order No 8', which would come into effect by November 1.

The order clearly states that any overseas individual or organisation, which means the Dalai Lama's set-up, must not control Tibetan Buddhist temple affairs.

Addressing a press conference on Wednesday here, Minister of the Department of Religion and Culture of the Tibetan government-in-exile, Tsering Phuntsok, said the new regulation is in total violation of the provisions of the Chinese Constitution, which guarantees freedom of religious belief for citizens of the People's Republic of China.

Phuntsok added that the new regulation has been designed to snap any possible links between Tibet-based monks and the Dalai Lama.

"Though China is a Communist country they have shown their political view on religious issues. They want to bring an end to the teaching sessions about our religion given by the Dalai Lama and top leaders of Tibetan communities," he added.

"They want the people and monks of all the monasteries and temples in China to be followers of Communism. So, we are protesting this regulation imposed by the Chinese government and have a press conference for it," he said

Phuntsok added that this regulation is also a means employed by the Chinese government to not only destroy the tradition and study of Tibetan Buddhism, but also uproot the monastic institutions and the transmission of Buddhist teachings in these centers of learning.

An estimated 80,000 Tibetans along with the Dalai Lama arrived in India in 1959 after an unsuccessful uprising against Chinese rule. By Akhilesh Bharati (ANI)

Tibetan Monk Talks Smack on China

Dharamshala: Ven. Tsering Phunstok, minister of the Department of Religion and Culture, held a press conference in Dharamshala today (27th October), to emphasize his objection to the regulations by Chinese officials regarding religious practice in Tibet.
The statement came in reaction to the State Administration of Religious Affairs of the People's Republic of China who on the 30th September 2010 issued "a regulation on the administration of Tibetan Buddhist Monasteries." The regulation relates to the how China will manage the reincarnation of living Buddhas in Tibetan Buddhism.

Tsering recounted the Constitution of the People's Republic of China, which states that "Religious bodies and religious affairs are not subject to any foreign domination," calling the recent regulation "proof of the fact that the citizens of the People's Republic of China do not have religious freedom and that the country is ruled by man and not by law."

He continued by saying "The religious heads and scholars of Tibetan Buddhism as a whole are, currently, living outside Tibet. Hence, the lineage of the sacred Buddhist teachings and initiations can be said to be existing in the exile Tibetan community."

He added that "this regulation is an evil design on the part of the Chinese government to obstruct the Buddhist teaching and its sacred transmissions inside Tibet and makes it extremely difficult for the monastic institutions to undertake important religious activities. This is also a means employed by the Chinese government to not only destroy the tradition and study of Tibetan Buddhism but also uproot the monastic institutions and the transmission of Buddhist teachings in these centers of learning by diluting the spiritual bond between teacher and pupil."

He concluded his statement with a clear message to the Chinese officials, saying that they repudiate "this injunction of the Chinese government" and "express our strong opposition to it."

Disaster Talks

Religious representatives debated Monday night whether modern day disasters are a divine punishment or natural occurrence at the fifth annual World Religions Conference at Red Deer College.

None of the men of various faiths — Islam, Buddhism, Christianity, aboriginal spirituality or Judaism — solely credited a greater being for these acts.

Islam representative Ataul Wahid LaHay was in fact the only speaker to say some calamities can be attributed to the hand of a higher power, as noted in the Qur’an.

“Islam does not believe that each and every accident of nature, disaster, upheaval or change for the worse is a reflection of divine punishment or chastisement,” the member of Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama’ said to the roughly 350 people in attendance.

“Nor is every divine punishment obtained by means of a natural disaster.”

LaHay explained that destructive mayhem is considered divine punishment if the event is foretold, made conditional, spares believers and annihilates evil ideologies.

Christianity representative Paul Vallee, a pastor, argued that God cannot complete evil acts that are not consistent with His good nature and therefore cannot be held accountable for disasters that range from floods to famines.

“It’s humanity sins that brings disasters into the world,” he said, then questioning why God does not stop such tumultuous events.

“God himself, he does utilize all these things in our lives to direct us back to him.”

Lyle W. Keewatin Richards, who spoke of aboriginal spirituality, agreed that world disasters are being created by humans who are not leading a balanced life.

“We are at a place where we’re taking far more than we’re giving back,” said the man born of a Cree mother. “We are changing this planet irrevocably. Whether or not it’s a natural disaster or whether it’s divine intervention, it’s irrelevant.”

Zvi Andrews Pardes, a masters student in religious studies, said Judaism does not ponder that which creates turmoil and instead focuses on a response to such events.

“There is an idea that suffering is reparative, that suffering has a role to play in your life,” he said. “A life with no suffering would involve no growing.”

Only Pliny Hayes, a practicing Buddhist for the past 30 years, denounced that natural disasters could be created by a divine being.

He relied on science to explain earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes, adding that Buddhists don’t believe in God (the Buddha, a human, was the “awakened one,” he said).

“These world calamities, earthquakes, tornadoes and hurricanes, are perfectly predictable in time and space,” Hayes said. “They’re predictable because they’re caused by natural phenomena. The main point is what can we do, all of us, to help the people who are suffering?”

The World Religions Conference, held at the Arts Centre Mainstage at RDC, provides speakers the opportunity to discuss a topic in an attempt to dismiss any religious misunderstandings as well as to explore any similarities shared by different faiths.

Lama Talking Again

On the afternoon of Thursday, Oct. 21, I was lucky enough to see the 14th Dalai Lama speak in Ox- ford, Ohio. And let me tell you, it did not turn out exactly how I expected.

A couple months ago, my friend Elizabeth, who attends Miami University, called me and asked if I would like to go with her to the Dalai Lama's speech when he would be in Oxford. I was incredibly excited for this opportunity, and was honored that Elizabeth would ask me to go with her. I don't have any sort of personal ties to Buddhism or His Holiness, but Elizabeth and I are both journalism majors and on the staff for publications at our respective universities, so we were definitely giddy to see such an important figure speak.

The Dalai Lama is the most influential and revered individual in Tibetan Buddhism. Members of Tibetan Buddhism believe that the Dalai Lamas are reincarnations of one another, and the cur- rent one was chosen for his position at the age of two. His life has been spent preaching the message of peace around the world, and as a 75-year-old man, he has certainly been a prominent member of pop culture for a long time.

I drove down to Oxford Thursday to see his speech, and Elizabeth and I were positively elated, exchanging several Facebook wall-to-walls and texts about our excitement. We fought the traffic to get to Miami's basketball arena, where the Dalai Lama would be speaking to 10,000 plus people. After making our way through airport-esque security, we found our floor seats and waited for the speech to start.

The first thing that surprised me was the lack of formality at the event. The president of Miami University gave a relatively short introduction before giving the stage over to the Dalai Lama.

His Holiness was dressed in traditional Tibetan Buddhist robes, but had also donned a red Miami visor for the occasion as well. He sat on a couch on the stage, explaining to the audience that he was a little too tired to stand for the entire hour-and-a- half speech, and asked for permission to rest his feet. His query was greeted with applause, which he chuckled at.

The Dalai Lama's speech was entitled "Ethics in a Modern World," but his talk was largely spontaneous. His Holiness preached simple messages during his time in the arena, focusing mostly on kindness to one other. He said that all humans have the choice to be kind and make others happy. People require a drive to achieve that happiness, and it's mostly a mental choice. Of all the points he made, the one I found to be most important was his statement on compassion.

His Holiness said all humans require compassion, a fact that may seem obvious to some. But, many people don't realize that every other person is very much the same, from a best friend to a worst enemy. Even the Dalai Lama has the same human needs as anyone else, he said, not long before he kicked off his shoes to get more comfortable.

I was really, really eager to see the Dalai Lama, and came out of the experience fulfilled, but for a different reason than I expected.

His Holiness is an incredibly important figure in the world, but he's also just a normal guy - a cool dude I'd love to sit down and have a conversation with. He may speak to sold-out crowds and has met many world leaders, but deep down, he's just like each and every one of us. It's a message that I think people have a hard time remembering, and a tough vision to live out. But His Holiness reenergized me to attempt to live that out in my daily life and spread his message to others.

New Buddhist Library in India

CHANDIGARH: The Beant Singh Memorial and Chandigarh Centre for Performing and Visual Arts has decided to set up a library having books in digital and physical forms. The library would have books related to religions including Jainism, Buddhism, Taoism, Zoroastrianism, Hinduism, Sikhism and Confucianism. Books on Indian folklore, history of different countries, Indian epics, biographies of Indian personalities, on world wars and on religious and cultural movements in India and the rest of the world would also be housed there.

Stating this, centre director NPS Randhawa revealed it has also been decided to purchase publications of universities and state governments. 'The Punjab digital library has been entrusted with the job of setting up a digital library at Beant Singh Memorial and Chandigarh Centre for Performing and Visual Arts. The library software has been installed on 20 computers. A presentation given on Tuesday related to digitization of books and its benefits in the 21st century as every library endeavours to offer the readers the best,' said Randhawa.

At a meeting in this connection under chairmanship of adviser to UT administrator Pradip Mehra on Tuesday, it was decided that a special committee would visit the upcoming Delhi Book Fair between December 27 and January 2 to shortlist the books to be purchased.

It was further decided that a membership campaign for the lib

Texas Science of Mind

“If you are happy with your life the way that it is now, great; keep thinking and doing what you have been thinking and doing to get the results that you have now! However, if you want to change your life, any part of your life, you must change what you think and then do what your new thoughts lead you to do,” says Sr. Minister Rev. Lee Wolak.

Rev. Wolak is the founding minister of the Agape Center for Spiritual Living (www.VisitAgapeNow.com) based in Plano, TX, a northern suburb of Dallas, Texas.

Wolak said: “The founder of Religious Science, Dr. Ernest Holmes, never intended to start a church or a religion. He really did understand how controversial any type of religion can be. He wrote “The Science of Mind” as a text book which he used along with many of his other books, to build a series of lectures that were attended by thousands of people. Dr. Holmes required that the ideas and practices of how to cause your life to improve, be kept simple and removed from religious conflicts.”

It was more important to Ernest Holmes to help one person to demonstrate abundance, peace, health, wealth, happiness, and prosperity, than to have one million people praise him personally.

His writings have been quoted by almost every inspirational speaker worldwide, many of whom don’t even know it. The Science of Mind teaches a five step positive or affirmative prayer. ”Once you learn how to use these New Thought tools to build a new mindset, you start to notice that your life improves really fast. This applies to both your personal and business lives.”

These New Thought principles and practices are alive and well and available to anyone who wants to see, hear or to experience them, every Sunday at the Agape Center for Spiritual Living. To find the map to the Agape center, visit: http://tinyurl.com/AgapeMap or call 972-302-9907.

Wikipedia, the largest and most widely recognized online encyclopedia in the world, said of Dr. Ernest Holmes: “His influence beyond New Thought can be seen in the Self-Help movement.”

Rev. Lee Wolak is the featured presenter on several professionally produced free web videos where he expresses the New Thought, Science of Mind message. To find access to this free resource, visit: http://tinyurl.com/RevLeeWolak

Tibetan Rugs at the Met

Rugs and Ritual in Tibetan Buddhism, an installation dedicated to ritual practice in Tibetan Vajrayana Buddhism, explores the role of the ritual objects that were employed by its practitioners in pursuit of spiritual enlightenment. Comprising 30 tantric ritual rugs and utensils-including knives, vessel, fire-offering ladles, ritual staff, daggers, offering table-the installation illustrates an esoteric Buddhism that flourished in Tibet from its beginnings in the eighth century through to the 20th century. While many of the objects on view-depicting gruesome images such as exposed brains in skull cups and flayed human skins-may be shocking to those unfamiliar with the meaning and purpose of Tibetan religious art, the deployment of these objects celebrates the power of detachment from the corporeal body that advanced Buddhist practitioners strive to attain. The installation features Tibetan rugs and ritual utensils from the collection of Anthony d'Offay, London, together with New York-based loans and works from the Museum's own collection.

Vajrayana ('Diamond Vehicle') refers to the advanced school of Mahayana Buddhism practiced in Tibet. Vajrayana has, at its core, the pursuit of higher spiritual awareness and ultimate enlightenment through the study and mastery of ritual activities, whose purpose is to remove obstacles on this path. Those obstacles-ignorance, greed and delusion-hindering spiritual advancement are characterized as the "three poisons"; much of the ritual enactment is devoted to quelling the negative passions. Works on view includes a personified ritual dagger, Phurba Emanation of Padmasambhava as Guru Dragmar, which was used to slay these passions in an exorcism-type performance.

The installation includes colorful rugs and a rich assortment of ritual paraphernalia. Highlights are two large cloth paintings of the late 16th century depicting wrathful protective deities-such fearsome imagery was displayed in a Tibetan monastery's chapel dedicated to the wrathful protective deities, in a room reserved for tantric initiation rites. Mahakala-an emanation of transcendental Buddha Akshobhya, and the principal destroyer of the corporeal bonds tying human to material and physical existence-is represented in both tangka paintings and sculptures, along with an extraordinary sculpture of a wild ascetic, probably a mahasidda, one of the advanced yogic practitioners revered in Tibetan Buddhism. He drinks from a skull cup, celebrating his detachment from bodily concerns.

Rugs and Ritual in Tibetan Buddhism is organized by John Guy, Curator of South and Southeast Asian Art in the Metropolitan Museum's Department of Asian Art.

In conjunction with the installation, gallery talks led by John Guy will be offered on November 3, December 13, and January 26. He will also narrate a podcast episode related to the installation that will be available online at www.metmuseum.org/podcast.

The installation is featured on the Museum's website at www.metmuseum.org.

5,000 Gather to Pray in India

KANPUR: On a day when the country was busy burning the effigies of demon king, the villagers of nondescript Pukhrayan village in Ramabai Nagar had gathered to worship Ravana and to embrace Buddhism on the occasion of Dussehra or Vijaya Dashmi on Sunday.

Over 5,000 dalits embraced Buddhism in the presence of 12 Buddhist monks during Ambedkar Baudh Deeksha ceremony held at the Krishi Mandi Samiti `maidan' in Pukhrayan, 70-km from the city. In addition to the converts, several thousand other persons came to witness the ceremony. The converts were mostly from Allabahad, Hardoi, Azamgarh, Auraiyya, Kannauj, Unnao, Agra, Firozabad and rural pockets like Bhognipur, Akbarpur, Rura, Derapur, Sikandara and Shivli villages of Kanpur Dehat.

Before taking the oath, they took out a long procession. A man seated on a chariot and depicting Ravana's character was hailed by them. They showered flowers and threw colours on the procession.

Later, Bhante Angulmal, a Buddhist monk, along with many other monks delivered a sermon and made people take oath to follow principles of the Buddhist religion with utmost dedication.

"From today onwards, we would only abide by the principles of Lord Buddha," said middle-aged Ram Vilas Sachan, who had travelled all the way from Fatehpur to attend the ceremony in Pukhranya.

Dhani Rao Baudh Panther, president, Bharatiya Dalit Panther party, who has been conducting the annual ceremony against the discrimination in the society, said: "We believe that Ravana was a `Dravidian' king of `Gond' tribe and a learned person, well-versed in the vedas. We have been organising this Baudh Deekhsha ceremony every year so that the future generation can remember his (Ravana) sacrifice and continue the tradition."

Retired IAS Chandrapal Arun, former vice-chancellor, Jhansi University, Anil Kumar and deputy general manager, enforcement, Base Yamuna Power limited, Ramesh Chandra were present on the occasion.

Dalai Lama to Speak to H.S. Students in England

OXFORD — Select students at Talawanda High School will attend the address by the 14th Dalai Lama at Miami University on Thursday, thanks to a close partnership between the two schools.
Seniors Lexie Withrow, Christina Lindner, Morgan Cox, Josh Owens and Dylon Kalous said they are anxious to learn more about the exiled leader of Tibet during his sold-out lecture “Ethics in a Modern World.”
“I’m hoping he’ll explain about himself and the history of what he does,” Withrow said. “I’m also excited for the question and answer session. It’s cool that he’s interested in what we think.”
“I’m really interested in Buddhism, so I hope I’ll get more insight about it,” Lindner said. “I also think it’ll be just a really cool experience in general, especially to see someone that esteemed.”
Cox said a lot of people could be inspired by His Holiness.
“I’d also like to learn more about Buddhism, and I have never seen anyone that’s as big of a historical icon, either,” she said.
Owens and Kalous said they don’t know much about His Holiness.
“I hope he’ll come explain about himself and tell what he’s trying to do ... but whatever he talks about really will be a cool experience,” Owens said.
Miami has listed prohibited items and other important information about attending the public address online at muohio.edu/dalai-lama.
Free tickets may still be available to view the lecture by video from other locations on Miami’s campus. For more information, visit tickets.muohio.edu.

Budda Relics to Massachusetts

WORCESTER — The life story and teachings of Siddhartha Gautama — a wealthy prince born in northern India sometime between the fifth and sixth centuries B.C. — laid the foundations for the establishment of Buddhism, the world’s fourth largest religion.

After his death, Gautama, who’s revered as the historical Buddha, was cremated.

This weekend, hundreds are expected to visit Worcester to view a precious collection of about 1,000 sacred Buddhist relics, which include pearl-like crystals that were reputedly found among the former royal’s remains.

“We are very happy that the relics are here,” said the Venerable Thich Tri Hoa, the abbess of Linh Son Temple on Ruthven Avenue, where the historical objects will be displayed.

The exhibition will open at 6 p.m. today with a blessing ceremony. During the ritual, the relics will be placed on the crown of the participants’ heads.

The public is also invited to view the relics from 10 a.m. to 7 p.m. tomorrow and from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.

The collection, which will be permanently displayed in a shrine now under construction in Kushinagar, India, is visiting a number of sites around the globe.

It also includes relics of Maudgalyayana, Sariputra, and Ananda, the Buddha’s closest disciples, as well as the remains of spiritual masters from many Buddhist traditions.

Visitors reportedly experience inspiration and healing when in the presence of the relics. Many Buddhists believe the relics embody the Buddha masters’ spiritual compassion and wisdom, and are produced by the masters themselves at their deaths.

“The relics touch and open hearts,” said Jeff Bailey, who is associated with the temple. “The exhibit’s goal is to promote love and kindness.”

The collection also includes a life-size statue of the Maitreya, who according to Buddhist scriptures, will be the next Buddha.

Maitreya is expected to bestow teachings, which will bring love and kindness to the world.

“The arrival of Maitreya is similar to Christ’s second coming in Christian tradition,” explained Mr. Bailey.

He said it’s never been scientifically proven that the remains are of the historical Buddha or of his dearest followers.

“The question has been lost in antiquity. Most Buddhists believe but nobody knows for sure,” he said. “In reality, it doesn’t matter. What’s important is the reason for the visit — to spread love and understanding.”

The Venerable Man Shing said the timing of the visit is important, given all the uncertainties Americans are facing.

She noted that many are out of work and have lost their homes and ways of life.

“Uncertainty is everywhere. Faith in our social institutions is faltering,” said the Venerable Man Shing. “With this social malaise beginning to manifest in an insidious way, it is our hope that these relics and our heartfelt prayers will bring some relief, comfort, inspiration, and life transforming processes in people’s hearts.”

The Venerable Tri Hoa said she expects Buddhists from all over New England to visit. She said the collection’s only other regional stop is Hartford.

The tour is organized by officials with the Maitreya Project, who are constructing the complex in Kushinagar.

In addition to building a religious facility, project officials are also constructing space from which workers will provide spiritual, educational and health care services to residents of that area, considered one of the poorest in India.

They’re also hoping to improve the area’s infrastructure, as well as helping individuals find work.

The temple earlier this year hosted the visit of a $5 million, four-ton translucent jade statue of the Buddha. Officials said that thousands attended that weekend event.

Meditation Party in India

On Wednesday afternoon, at Pattaya City Hall, the Advisor to the Mayor- Mr. Bandit Siritanyong commenced a meeting attended by the representatives of relevant government and private sectors, to gather ideas for a Buddhism Ceremony focused on meditation, to lift up the spiritual level of people in the city.

This meeting was held in cooperation with the “Satien Tamma Satarn”, a well-known Buddhist center in Bangkok, represented by its founder- the famous Buddhist Thai nun “Mae Chee Sansanee”. Other participants were the “Sut Tang Rak Restaurant” located on Jomtien Beach, represented by Mr. Daeng, and Pattaya City Hall. The group is seeking a way to combine Buddhism with Safety Security Procedures, to help decrease the numbers of criminals in the city by sending them to be trained in the Buddha’s Dhamma, to help bring peace in the community. The teachings will be at the Alcazar Hall, aided by the Pattaya Police, who will bring prostitutes from the North Pattaya areas to attend the teachings. After the preaching and training program in the morning, all are invited to a dinner treat in the evening at the “ Alangkarn Entertainment Hall” on Sukhumvit road, in the Huay Yai district.

Hindu and Christian to Dialogue

Renowned Hindu statesman Rajan Zed has welcomed hosting of dialogue by Archbishop of Canterbury Dr. Rowan Douglas Williams with five Hindu swamis (ascetics) in Bangalore (India) on October 20, "to engage in discussions for mutual understanding".

Zed, who is President of Universal Society of Hinduism, in a statement in Nevada (USA) today, said that serious and honest interfaith dialogue was the need of the hour. Religion was the most powerful, complex and far-reaching force in our society, so we must take it seriously. And we all knew that religion comprised much more than our own particular tradition/experience, Zed stressed.

Rajan Zed further says that in our shared pursuit for the truth, we can learn from one another and thus can arrive nearer to the truth. The dialogue may help us vanquish the stereotypes, prejudices, caricatures, etc., passed on to us from previous generations. As dialogue brings us reciprocal enrichment, we shall be spiritually richer than before the contact.

To be held at Whitefield Ecumenical Centre, participants besides Williams include: Tridandi Srimannarayana Ramanuja Chinna Jeeyar (Hyderabad), Sugunendra Theertha (Udupi), Harshanand (Bangalore), Shivamurthy Shivachary, Paramananda Bharati (Sringeri Math), and Chakravarthi Ram-Prasad (United Kingdom).

Its two sessions are titled as "Visions of the Divine" and "Social Harmony", which will be followed by public question-answer session, totaling dialogue about three and a half hours. "The Swamis and the Archbishop will discuss the social values central to their respective traditions and ask how a pluralist society can encourage and protect true freedom of belief", according to a release by Kate Wharton from Lambeth Palace in London.

Williams is visiting India from October nine to 24, travelling across Kolkata, Ranchi, Nagpur, New Delhi, Chennai, Vellore, Bangalore and Thiruvananthapurum. He will deliver the Chevening Lecture at New Delhi entitled "Pluralism and the Dialogue of Religions". It is his third visit to India.

Archbishop Williams is the senior bishop of the worldwide Anglicans, a Christian denomination, who number around 77 million. Hinduism, oldest and third largest religion of the world has about one billion adherents and moksh (liberation) is its ultimate goal. (ANI)