FPMT Community: Stories & News

Participant of the first Insight Meditation Home Practice, February 2015. Photo courtesy of Institut Vajra Yogini.

Director François Lecointre shares news of an exciting new development in Institut Vajra Yogini’s programming – insight meditation retreat from the comfort of your home:

One hundred people from around the world took part in the first Insight Meditation Home Practice on February 22, 2015. Ven. Antonio Satta designed this new event and Institut Vajra Yogini coordinated this international project from France. This practice will take place the last Sunday of every month and is available for students who have participated in one of Ven. Antonio’s insight meditation retreats in the past. Students received detailed instructions a few days before the practice and were invited to follow Ven. Antonio’s one-day retreat schedule from home or wherever they are in the world. The day is comprised of seven sitting sessions – from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m – 40 minutes each with a 20-minute break in between, plus a one-hour break for lunch. Students stayed silent and turned off mobile phones and computers for the entire length of the practice day.

Ven. Antonio Satta

Students from many European countries – Austria, Belgium, France, Germany, Hungary, Italy, Netherlands, Slovenia, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, and the United Kingdom – participated. People also joined from Australia, Tahiti and the United States. Feedback from this first experience is very positive. Although some people admitted that the practice was demanding and that it was not easy to follow the discipline at home, most students seem to have appreciated the feeling of connection coming from meditating together as a group, even though they were far apart. They also felt very grateful to be able to receive Ven. Antonio’s precise instructions.

The second practice day is planned for March 29, 2015. All students who have previously attended an insight retreat with Ven. Antonio can still sign up. Those who missed the first practice, however, have to find a day to make up for the missed session, since the instructions change progressively from one month to the next. Please contact Institut Vajra Yogini for more information or to sign up.

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

Spiritual program coordinator Arnaud Berger circumambulates a box worms as part of Shantideva Meditation Center’s first event in its new animal liberation program, New York City, United States, January 2015. Photo courtesy of Shantideva Meditation Center.

“On January 23, Shantideva Meditation Center celebrated the first event in our new animal liberation program,” reported director Jennifer Kim from New York City. “We rescued approximately 2,000 red worms from the danger of terrible suffering and death as fishing bait. Despite many obstacles and a long journey, the worms arrived just in time for their ceremony. During the recitation of prayers and mantras, Shantideva students took turns circumambulating the worms around the altar, and afterwards, they received blessed water and much love from each of us. After residing for a few days at a student’s home where they listened to mantras recorded by Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the dear worms were carried through a snowstorm to the compassionate representatives of a composting facility where they will live luxuriously while benefiting the environment.

“It is with great joy and gratitude that we hope to have repaid a small part of the immense generosity of so many of our kind mother sentient beings! We rejoice in following the advice given to Shantideva Meditation Center by Lama Zopa Rinpoche and we dedicate these merits to his long and stable life.

“We also offer great thanks to Desmond Hosford, our new animal liberation manager, for initiating and managing this program out of his sincere compassion for animals and devotion to Lama Zopa Rinpoche.”

Benefiting animals in any way possible is a priority for FPMT and one of Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Vast Visions for the organization. Both the Lama Zopa Rinpoche Bodhichitta Fund and the Animal Liberation Fund support animal liberation activities around the world. 

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

Many volunteers worked together to publish the first Gelug prayer book in Latvian, Riga, Latvia, December 2014. Photo by Daina Jakobsone.

Center director Agnese Bishofa from Ganden Buddhist Mediation Centre in Latvia sent Mandala some exciting news about their 10th anniversary and the completion of the first Gelug prayer book in Latvian:

We are happy to announce the release of the first ever compilation of prayers and practices used in the Gelug tradition in Latvian, a language of approximately 2.5 million people. This is the first publishing project done by Ganden Buddhist Meditation Centre and was done in cooperation with Happy Monks Publications.

The first stack of Latvian prayer books produced in part by Ganden Buddhist Meditation Centre, Riga, Latvia, December 2014. Photo by Sigita Pudane.

The publishing project of a Latvian prayer book started with the idea and encouragement of Aryatara Institut’s resident teacher Ven. Fedor Stracke, who has been coming to teach at Ganden Centre on a regular basis since 2010.

Step by step the 70-page booklet was put together to include many essential prayers such as the Heart Sutra, Eight Verses of Thought Transformation, Three Principal  Aspects of the Path and The Source of All Good Qualities. The work was done by a group of volunteers: Aija Skrastina, Edgars Celms, Gunita Kakteniece, Helmuts Ancans, Inese Zelmane, Jana Gavare, Maija Seja, Rita Veilande, and Uldis Balodis, all who worked on translations and editing; and Ilze Isaka, who did design and layout.

The cover image by Jane Seidlitz and some drawings by Andy Weber as inside art makes this precious book even more wish-fulfilling.

Happy Monks Publications fully supported the project financially, and it was printed in Nepal and delivered to us for Lama Tsongkhapa Day (December 16, 2014), accompanied by another precious present from Ven. Fedor, a copy of the 8,000-Line Perfection of Wisdom Sutra, for Ganden’s altar.

The center was founded in 2004 and our 10th year was blessed by many auspicious events: His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s and His Eminence Choden Rinpoche’s visits; Sera Je monks staying in Riga for three weeks during their “Tour for Compassion and Harmony;” and of course, teachings from our FPMT visiting teachers – Geshe Ngawang Thugje, Geshe Thubten Sherab, Ven. Angie Muir, Ven. Lobsang Namgyel, Ven. Lobsang Tony, Andy Wistreich, Andy Weber, Stephan Wormland and Ven. Lobsang Tendar, who offered three nyung näs for the New Year.

Rejoicing in the merits created by all supporters, we offered Lama Chöpa with tsog and more than 108 candle lights for the further flourishing of Losang Dragpa’s teachings, world peace and the well-being of all sentient beings and long lives of our teachers.

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

The Revd. Justin Welby, Archbishop of Canterbury with Sikh representative Kulwant Singh Dhesi and Ven. Lobsang Dawa. Photo courtesy of Jamyang Mindrol-ling.

Staff from Jamyang Mindrol-ling, a study group in Coventry, United Kingdom reports:

With the current interest in mindfulness meditation growing, Jamyang Mindrol-ling has launched a new meditation group which meets twice a month in Coventry. The aim is to root the practice firmly in the Tibetan Buddhist tradition while giving anyone who is interested a chance to try out or practice this ancient technique for calming the mind and body. 

Meeting on the 2nd and 4th Thursdays of each month, the group is led by Jamyang Mindrol-ling’s resident teacher Ven. Lobsang Dawa, who is also continuing the ongoing Discovering Buddhism course with classes on karma and refuge in 2015.

Venerable Dawa was amongst a group of Coventry Faith representatives who were invited to meet the Archbishop of Canterbury, the Revd. Justin Welby on his recent January 2015 visit to Coventry.

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

Ven. Ann McNeil teaching at Chenrezig Institute, Eudlo, Queensland, Australia, 1975. Photo courtesy of the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive.

Ven. Ann McNeil, one of Lama Yeshe’s and Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s most senior Western students, passed away on Sunday, February 22, 2015, in British Columbia, Canada. Known as Anila Ann, she became a student of Lama Yeshe in 1970, when she met him in Kathmandu, Nepal. She ordained the same year, which you can read about in the post “Ann McNeil and Ordination,” on Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive’s “Big Love” blog.

Anila Ann was the first director of Chenrezig Institute (CI), the first FPMT center, founded in 1974 in Eudlo, Queensland, Australia. Chenrezig Institute shared on their Facebook page that “it is due to [Anila Ann’s] kindness, and the kindness of Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, that we are here today. She lay the foundations for the flourishing, colorful Buddhist center that CI is today. We are incredibly grateful for all she did for us and the Dharma.”

Anila Ann McNeil. Photo courtesy of FPMT North America’s Facebook page.

More recently, Anila Ann talked about her work as a Buddhist chaplain with prisoners in a 2011 interview with Mandala. “I loved teaching no matter the classification of the prison,” she said. “As far as teaching goes, it was very unusual to have the same students for less than four or five years. I’ve known most for 10 years and longer.” 

“Let your happiness show,” she said in the same interview. “Look people in the eye with a big smile and say ‘Hello, hi, how are you?’ Be ready to assist anybody if they want it.”

Anila Ann was a true FPMT pioneer. (The Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive has many photos of Anila Ann from the early days of FPMT.) She touched countless lives over her more than 40 years of serving her gurus, helping to spread the authentic Dharma in the West and leading the way for many students to come. She will be deeply missed. 

We will run a full obituary for Anila Ann McNeil in our next print issue. 

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

Lama Yeshe Ling’s promotional material for its “Dalai lama Double Feature.” Image courtesy of Lama Yehse Ling Centre.

On January 25, Lama Yeshe Ling, an FPMT center serving the greater Toronto area in Ontario, Canada, hosted a screening of two documentary films featuring His Holiness the Dalai Lama – Dalai Lama Awakening and Compassion in Action – with question and answer discussion with director Khashyar Darvich. Spiritual program coordinator David Gould shared some news on the event:

“The event these films document is a gathering in Dharamsala, India, of 40 professionals in science, art, education and business, who are given the task of synthesizing new solutions to world problems. For 10 days this group met with His Holiness and worked on problems and solutions. If this sounds familiar, it may be due to an earlier film called Dalai Lama Renaissance of which the current films are the director’s cuts. We had 134 members of the wider community (mostly new faces) come for the screening. We found that promoting these films was very easy – the Dalai Lama opens doors!

“The first film, Dalai Lama Awakening, is a journey taken by a collection of people with differing perspectives trying to find ways to work together and be constructive. One thing that makes this film so effective is that the audience witnesses how all participants softened and opened their hearts over the course of the event. The conclusions they eventually come to may not surprise a Buddhist, but were quite unexpected among the participants. The second film, Compassion in Action, presents some of the problems they settled upon and some of the constructive approaches the group and His Holiness recommend.

“Through the power of film and the power of the presence of His Holiness in these films, our guests regularly left comments like ‘life-changing.’ Personally, having seen both films twice now, I am not embarrassed to say I cried with inspiration throughout both films, maybe even more the second time around. We recommend that everyone consider hosting a screening.”

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

We’re pleased to announce that International Office’s FPMT Annual Review 2014: Preserving, Developing and Spreading the Mahayana Tradition is available for the worldwide FPMT community in eZine and PDF formats.

“All the work we are doing in FPMT is to accomplish the most important thing, not only for oneself, but for the numberless sentient beings, who are the most important. Our aim is to benefit them in many ways,” FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche says in the FPMT Annual Review 2014. 

You can read Rinpoche’s letter along with updates from FPMT Inc. CEO Ven. Roger Kunsang and FPMT Inc. Board of Directors chair Karuna Cayton in this year’s review. We also highlight the accomplishments of FPMT International Office in its work to help actualize Lama Yeshe’s and Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Vast Visions for FPMT. Please take a moment to rejoice with us for all that has been achieved! 

FPMT International Office is based in Portland, Oregon, and provides the necessary framework for all FPMT activity, develops and delivers high quality education programs and materials, maintains several primary channels for communication, manages charitable projects key to FPMT’s mission, coordinates communication between Lama Zopa Rinpoche and the larger organization and provides support to FPMT centers, projects and services.

February is a month when the incomparable kindness of Lama Yeshe comes to mind.

Thirty-one years ago this year, on Losar (celebrated on February 19 in 2015), FPMT’s precious founder, Lama Yeshe passed away.  A year later, on February 12, 1985, Tenzin Ösel Hita was born in Spain and soon after was recognized by His Holiness the Dalai Lama as the unmistaken reincarnation of Lama Yeshe. Tenzin Ösel was enthroned in March 1987 at Tushita Retreat Center in Dharamsala, India.

In recent years, FPMT students have been so happy to stay closely connected to Tenzin Ösel through his  personal messages via social media.

The Big Love Fund was established by remembering the kindness of Lama Yeshe and wanting to offer support to Tenzin Ösel’s educational endeavors. As Tenzin Ösel finds his own unique way of benefiting others,  this fund is one way that FPMT is able to support and encourage him. 

Please rejoice in the incredible kindness of Lama Yeshe and join us in celebrating Tenzin Ösel’s thirty years among us.

Later in 2015, Tenzin Ösel (pictured above drumming in Bali earlier this year) is leading a pilgrimage to India and Nepal from April 12-26, 2015. Details of this pilgrimage, along with information on how to book, can be found by visiting Más Allá del Viaje (Beyond the Journey).

You are welcome to offer any amount to the Big Love Fund in support of Tenzin Ösel’s educational endeavors. You can learn more about the fund, or more about Tenzin Ösel and his current activities.

Screen shot from AstroTibet ’14. Photo courtesy of Liberation Prison Project.

Dharma Practice Dates on FPMT.org is a collaborative project between FPMT International Office and Liberation Prison Project, an FPMT service offering Dharma support to interested prisoners around the world. Dharma Practice Dates is drawn from the Liberation Tibetan Calendar, prepared by Nawang Thartho and based on Tibetan Medical and Astrological Institute’s calendar with additional advice from Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Geshe Nawang Dakpa.

The calendar marks auspicious and inauspicious dates for various activities in addition to days that are favorable and unfavorable according to the combination of elements of earth, air, fire and water. These combinations impact on the effectiveness of one’s activities as well as one’s health.

Liberation Prison Project also makes the calendar available as an app – AstroTibet ’15 – on iTunes, for iPhones and iPads, and from Amazon and Google Play for Android devices. AstroTibet ’15 contains the full calendar and also features audio recordings of the mantras for each month, chanted by Geshe Sangpo and Ven. Lhamo at Kadampa Center, Raleigh, North Carolina, United States, so you can hear the mantra pronunciation and tunes.

Purchases of Liberation Tibetan Calendar in print and as an app support the beneficial projects of Liberation Prison Project.

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.

Good wishes for Losar from Lama Zopa Rinpoche and all at FPMT International Office!

We also hope you enjoy our February E-News, in which you will find:

• Updates to Rinpoche’s Schedule
• Remembering the Kindness – Tenzin Osel Hita Turns 30!
• New Materials and other news from FPMT Education Services
• Time to send in your Merit Box donations!

  and more!

  

  Lama Zopa Rinpoche making a request to His Holiness the Dalai Lama during the Jangchup Lamrim teachings, South India, December 2014.
  Photo by Bill Kane.

Monks working on memorization at Sera IMI House, Bylakuppe, India, November 2013. Photo by Sandesh Kapur|www.felis.in.

“Memorization: Beneficial Exercise for the Mind,” our online feature story for February, has just been published! American monk Ven. Tenzin Gache (Brian Roiter), who just finished his seventh year at Sera Je Monastic University, writes about the history and role of memorization in monastic education and offers memorization tips to help lay students build their own memorization skills. Earlier this month, Ven. Gache received the top award in Sera Je’s lo gyü chenmo (Great Memorization Exam), having committed 873 pages to memory. Here’s a short excerpt from Ven. Gache’s article, which you can read in its entirety on FPMT.org/Mandala:

In his biography of his teacher, Khedrub Je claims that Lama Tsongkhapa would memorize an astounding 17 folios (34 pages) of Buddhist text per day. Two natural reactions to this statement might be, “Is that even possible? It must be exaggerated,” and “Is that really a constructive use of one’s time and energy?” Without giving direct answers to these questions, I would like to respond first by describing a little bit about the place of memorization in Buddhist practice, both historically and today, and some of its potential benefits.

Memorization has played a central role in the Buddhism’s saga since its earliest days. For the first few hundred years, the sutras and their commentaries were not written down. Monks and nuns would work together to keep these discourses in memory, orally passing them on to the next generation. In the First Council of Arhats shortly after the Buddha’s passing [also known as the First Buddhist Council, c. 550-450 BCE], his attendant Ananda recited from memory the entirety of the Sutra Pitaka [the collection of sutras], while another monk, Upali, recited the discourses on vinaya [monastic discipline]. Even after these discourses were committed to paper, memorization remained a standard practice in the monasteries and nunneries of India. The great scholar-practitioner Acharya Vasubandhu [c. 4th century CE] is said to have maintained a yearly ritual wherein he would sit upright for several days, gradually reciting all of the texts he had memorized in a bathtub of oil to keep himself awake. More recently, Geshe Rabten [1921-86 CE] observed a similar yearly ritual, but without the oil.

Memorization of the sutras and their commentaries is a standard monastic practice in all Buddhist countries, but here I will focus mainly on its expression in my own monastery, Sera Je, one of the three great Gelug monastic universities now located in South India. … read more

In case you missed last month’s online feature, “Jeffrey Hopkins’ Transmission of Honesty,” you can read it now. If you like Mandala’s online features, consider becoming a Friends of FPMT, which supports our work as well as the education programs of FPMT.

Geshe Kelsang Wangmo teaching at Jamyang Buddhist Centre London, November 2014. Photo by Natascha Sturny.

“We were very honored to welcome Geshe Kelsang Wangmo last November,” said Jamyang Buddhist Centre London’s Natascha Sturny. “She kindly agreed to visit us as part of her first UK tour at the invitation of FPMT UK.

“On the evening of November 14, Geshe Wangmo gave a public talk on her experience of studying to become a geshe. The big gompa was full with people happy to meet Geshe-la for the first time and curious to hear her story.

“Many of the audience probably knew that she was the first woman in history to receive the Geshe degree, but to actually hear the story from herself was a great pleasure, often funny and definitely ‘mind blowing.’ Geshe Wangmo enthusiastically, and with a good portion of humor, explained in detail of how she became a geshe. The audience was charmed by her personality, eagerly listening and asking questions. Many were left admiring Geshe Wangmo‘s strength and determination to go through the scholastic curriculum for over 16 years.

“On November 16, Geshe Wangmo gave a day-long teaching on ‘Is the Buddha Reliable?’ Basing the talk on her own translation of and previous teaching on the second chapter of Dharmakirti’s Commentary on Pramana, she gave a superb overview of the chapter’s four sections that establish the Buddha is valid, authoritative and reliable.

“We eagerly await her return sometime in the next two years as she has promised to teach for four days on the same chapter, giving more depth to her presentation of each of the sections.”

Mandala brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings and events from nearly 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you like what you read on Mandala, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.