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August 2011: Ven. Pemba Sherpa (FPMT board member, resident teacher and co-director of Cham Tse Ling, in Hong Kong) visited the Amdo Eye Hospital to report on its progress and operations.
Currently there are 24 people working in the hospital, including four doctors and four nurses who visit from the local government hospital a few times a week to perform the actual surgeries. The hospital is three and half stories high and has 36 beds to accommodate patients.
The full price for cataract surgery is about US$750 (4800 CNY), however for patients who cannot afford this, the surgery is offered for free or whatever amount they can manage. At this stage it is not possible to run the hospital totally free of charge, but the plan is to be able to offer more free or low cost surgeries, as the hospital expands.
August 2011: The inauguration of the building was in July 2010, it took a year to equip the hospital and get the necessary documents to be able to perform the surgeries and in August 2011 the hospital was officially opened to the public. In the last four weeks the hospital has performed eight surgeries and four of these were offered free. As the hospital becomes better known and receives more funding and equipment it will be able to perform many more surgeries. Currently the hospital is one of the largest hospitals in Xining dedicated solely to performing eye surgery.
Please watch a video of the inauguration of the Amdo Eye Hospital.
US$60,000 donated to build large Padmasambhava statue for a monastery in Asia.
Over US$1.6 million offered to build and house 21 statues including:
•A 70-foot (21-meter) statue of Padmasambhava with two consorts, each 25 feet (7.5 meters) high;
•Eighteen life-sized statues including the Eight Aspects of Padmasambhava over 6 feet (2 meters) high
A temple to house the statues utilizing art inspired by Padmasambhava’s experience of the pure land Zangdok Palri (Glorious Copper-Colored Mountain)
US$3,000 donated to build a Padmasambhava statue at Milarepa Center in Vermont, USA between 2 and 3 feet (about 1 meter)– Thanks to a 2009 International Merit Box grant!
US$100,000 offered to build a very large Wish-fulfilling Padmasambhava statue at a Sakya Monastery
Initial planning to build a 120-foot (36.5-meter) Padmasambhava statue in Khakhorin, Mongolia. This project is being undertaken by FPMT Mongolia.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche with His Holiness the Dalai Lama November 2011.July 2012: On the very auspicious occasion of the 610th Anniversary of Lama Tsongkhapa’s composition of his masterpiece Lam-rim Chen-mo (The Great Treatise on the Stages of the Path to Enlightenment) and the 600th Anniversary of Lama Tsongkhapa’s teaching of this text at Gaden Monastery for the first time, His Holiness the Dalai Lama will bestow teachings and transmissions on eighteen classic Lam-rim commentaries at the request of His Eminence Ling Rinpoche.
Beginning November 30, 2012 and continuing for 10-15 days, these teachings and transmissions will take place at Gaden Monastery and Drepung Monastery in Doeguling Tibetan Settlement, Mundgod, South India. In the latter part of 2013 His Holiness will continue these teachings and transmissions at Sera Monastery in Lugsung Samdupling Tibetan Settlement, Bylakuppe, South India.
As part of FPMT’s mission to preserve the Mahayana tradition, Lama Zopa Rinpoche has offered for FPMT to support these rare and precious teachings in various ways, including:
- Funding a sound system for the event.
- Printing 50,000 copies of five different texts needed for the teaching event.
- Providing bags for all the texts being offered.
To provide these offerings we need to raise $425,000. Can you help?
July 30, 2012 UPDATE:
Tremendous and heartfelt thanks to all who participated in raising funds for this precious teaching event. We are delighted to report that due to the kindness of many, we have been so far able to raise $350,000!
It has now been confirmed that His Holiness will continue these teachings and transmissions in 2013 at Sera Monastery in Lugsung Samdupling Tibetan Settlement, Bylakuppe, south India (exact dates to be announced).
Also there will a live webcast of the teachings available, for those unable to attend. The website address for the webcast will be announced in the future.
Heartfelt and tremendous thanks to everyone who contributed to raising all the funds needed for the 2012 sponsorship of this event.
Please visit the official website of this event for more information.
How Can I Make a Donation?
To make a tax-deductible donation:
Or simply send your check in US dollars payable to FPMT Inc. and write “Eighteen Great Lam-rim Commentaries Sponsorship” on the memo line.
FPMT Inc.
1632 SE 11th Avenue
Portland, OR 97214-4702
USA
The Preserving the Lineage Fund is a project of FPMT Inc. and is administered by FPMT International Office located in Portland, Oregon, United States. All donations made to this fund are tax-deductible within the United States in accordance with IRS Code article 501(c)(3) to the extent allowed by law.
For more information please contact: Charitable Projects Coordinator.
So I practiced my Tibetan writing for about six months in black ink, at the end of which I sent a sample to Rinpoche for assessment. Evidently passing the test, I got the go ahead to start writing in gold.
Since then, I have worked more or less steadily – depending on my work schedule and other life distractions. To date I have written 320 pages of what will be about 1400 pages in total. Eventually the text will go in the heart of the Maitreya statue to be built in India. My hope is always to write a page a day, which doesn’t often happen. But even if I only write a few lines, or even one letter, it feels worthwhile, and of course every time I set pen to paper I remember what Rinpoche told me about the benefits.
I spent a long time in the beginning looking at many examples to try and make my writing as beautiful and accurate as possible. At that point, writing a page took about seven hours. Gradually, my writing style has coalesced and I can write a page in about half that time. In 2001, when I went to Mongolia with Rinpoche, my job for three weeks was to stir the gold for Rinpoche every night – sometimes all night – while Rinpoche wrote the Prajnaparamita. That was truly magical – I felt like I was living one of those stories from centuries past, the kind we hear about in the teachings. But it didn’t occur to me that I would end up some years later doing the writing myself!
I feel tremendously blessed and grateful that Rinpoche has given me this amazing project. My hope is to finish well before I die, to create the cause to realize emptiness – the subject of the text – as quickly as possible, and for whatever merit is created through the writing, to fulfill all of Rinpoche’s holy wishes.
Ven. Tsering’s Progress
Ven. Tsering began writing the 12 volume Prajnaparamita in early 2002.
In 2006 he finished the first volume– about 800 pages.
Ven. Tsering finished the second volume in 2011– approximately 700 pages.
July 2012: He is currently halfway through the fourth volume (Jane Seidlitz is writing out the third volume).
About his work, Ven. Tsering says he, “feels very honored and fortunate to be doing this project.”
The Stupa Fund supports the making of over 1,000 small Kadampa stupas each year. These stupas are made by resident Sangha at Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s home in California and are dedicated for students who have passed away.
The fund has also recently pledged a total of US$51,000 to the Stupa Project at Land of Medicine Buddha, California, USA.
June 2012: We are delighted to present you with new videos which help illustrate the many benefits of this project.
“A Brief Introduction to the Sera Je Food Fund” is a short introduction and overview of the project.
“The Making of Food” is 23-minute video providing a virtual tour of how the food is prepared for all 2,600 monks at Sera Je Monastery.
All Sera Je Food Fund videos can be found on our new video page on the Sera Je Food Fund web page.
June 2012: We are delighted to present you with new videos which help illustrate the many benefits of this project.
“A Brief Introduction to the Sera Je Food Fund” is a short introduction and overview of the project.
“The Making of Food” is 23-minute video providing a virtual tour of how the food is prepared for all 2,600 monks at Sera Je Monastery.
All Sera Je Food Fund videos can be found on our new video page on the Sera Je Food Fund web page.
June 2012: FPMT was able to send US$115,000 to Sera Je Monastery. This contribution covers the next six months’ worth of meals for all 2,600 monks currently studying at Sera Je.
Thank you to all the kind benefactors who support this amazing project and please rejoice in this incredible offering that we are able to make to the Sangha, our future center geshes and to His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
“If you offer with the recognition that they are the guru’s pores,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche said in 2011, “then that is an unbelievable way to collect merit. When you offer to many Sangha who have the same guru, then you are making offerings to that many pores of the guru. This is the easiest way to collect skies of merit by offering. By offering even just one candy or flowers or even one grain of rice to a statue of Buddha or even a visualized Buddha, you collect skies of merit. It is much more powerful than offering to the Three Jewels (Buddha, Dharma, Sangha) as well as all the statues, stupas and scriptures existing in all directions, so there is no question if really offering to the same guru’s disciple. These benefits should be understood so that when you make offerings to the guru’s pores that you think correctly. This is the best business.”
Received May 2012: The sun is at its brightest at 9 a.m., but a soft breeze blows making the morning chilly. Hundreds of monks in their maroon robes begin to flow in, clutching a square cushion in their right hands, like someone going to the office would carry a briefcase, and a plate in their left hands. Soon the debate courtyard is full with thousands of them and before long the courtyard turns into a huge garden of red roses.
After an hour-and-a-half long prayer session, everyone scatters all over the courtyard, each looking for a debate partner. In less than a minute the whole yard is covered with monks debating in pairs.
Thousands of hands clapping together with loud voices of Dharma discussion makes it sound like the middle of India’s busiest train station. Everyone seems so enthusiastic and absorbed in debate. Amazed and transfixed by the atmosphere around me, I hardly notice that time is running. It is 11:30 a.m. when the disciplinary master signals the conclusion of the morning session.
The senior monks gradually move towards the dining hall but so many other junior ones are still fully engaged in the high fever of debate, looking so determined to prove their side of the argument.
By the time I find my seat in the dining room, many senior monks have taken theirs in the front rows as more monks make their way into the dining room. Soon the hall is filled with thousands of monks and a deep voice far in front begins to roar. I realize it is the prayer from Lama Tsongkhapa’s “Songs of Experience,” with its repeated verse: “I, the practitioner has practiced in this way. You the seeker of liberation, practice in the same way.”
As I listen to this prayer, my eyes roll over the many monks sitting around me. All of them look like they are in their thirties and forties, mostly quite skinny, the maroon of their robes a little faded, heads fully shaved, yet looking glorious sitting so calmly in concentration, perhaps contemplating the words of the prayer. Then hundreds of junior monks rush in with basins, buckets and kettles of food. It is an international marathon with Indians, Europeans, Americans, Chinese and Koreans among the procession serving the meal.
I am totally thrilled by this spectacular atmosphere, but as the serving of food begins my heart suddenly fills with a strange mixture of joy and sentiment. I am thrown back down memory lane to when Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche was emphasizing so much about the Sera Je Food Fund project, when he explained to every benefactor about its importance, and the time he put his palms together to appeal for support for the project. I recall Rinpoche working so hard to start this project and all the time and effort he took to make it run smoothly.
A part of my mind is rejoicing, “How wonderful the job Rinpoche has done! How kind he is. What an abundance of merit he let so many people create!” I cannot recall every thought that arose at that moment but it is all so emotional, hearing the voice reciting Lama Tsongkhapa’s inspirational prayer above these thoughts as my heart is moved more than ever with rejoicing and admiration. Then my heart explodes with extraordinary faith and tears begin to roll down my cheeks, silently slipping under my spectacles. I come to realize only when a drop falls into my rice bowl. By then my voice has turned soft and I find myself crying uncontrollably. Perhaps people around me start to notice.
By now, rice, dhal and a piece of fruit is served to each monk in the hall and food offering prayers begin. I sense unconditional appreciation and profound dedication in every monk throughout the offering prayer. Everyone begins to eat. For me, it is the most delicious dhal and rice I ever tasted. Silence is unbroken while thousands of monks empty their bowls, but I cannot finish my share as the feeling of admiration for my guru’s extraordinary deed makes me constantly emotional.
Soon with dedication prayers completed, all the monks leave their seats making way for the juniors to clean the place. I have no choice but to leave with the remaining food left in my bowl. As I walk out I notice a group of old monks, mostly in their seventies and eighties, some crippled with stick in right hand and a bowl in the left.
I go up to one of them whom I know and ask why he needs to come all the way when he can send one of his young disciples to fetch food for him.
He gives me a toothless smile and answers: Eating in the Sangha assembly means not only sharing the food but sharing our merit by making it greater, making our merit stronger, and dedicating for the happiness of all sentient beings. It is also to rejoice in the great deeds of Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche and all the benefactors of the Food Fund. He puts his palms together every time the name of my guru was mentioned. He keeps saying that coming to the Sangha assembly is never troublesome to him when he thinks of what wonderful karma has been created by those who have made this food offering possible.
I feel so much joy to see for myself the immense benefits that Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche and his disciples worldwide have brought to the entire Sangha assembly of Sera Je Monastery through the Food Fund Project!
Written by Geshe Thubten Jinpa, November 28, 2011. Edited by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim April 4, 2012. Gently edited for inclusion here.
February 2012: Dried food was distributed to about 2,550 of our Sera Je monks! No, not to celebrate Valentine’s Day but because our main kitchen will be closed during the coming two weeks Losar (Tibetan New Year) holidays.
Each monk received 2.5 kg of rice, 4 kg of flour and 0.5 liter of cooking oil. In total, we have distributed 6375 kg of rice, 10,200 kg of flour and 1275 liters of cooking oil!
A BIG Thank You to all the Sera Je Food Fund sponsors!