Lama Zopa Rinpoche News and Advice

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with elephants, Bendigo, Australia, October 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche sent the following advice to a student who had slowly drifted apart from his son until there was no contact between them. The student had also lost two partners to cancer.

It is very good if you keep a lot of the eight auspicious signs. Keep different kinds—cloth, thangkas or wooden ones—all together or separate. Also there are many images of the four harmonious brothers, so you can try to get different kinds and have them around.

Offering elephant at The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Bendigo, Australia, November 2014. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Yes, it is karma, that is the basic thing. The eight auspicious signs and the four harmonious brothers are for protection from harm and for success.

Do your practice well. Abandon negative karma as much as possible and practice good karma. Especially transform your mind from ego, from self-cherishing, to cherishing others and if possible into bodhichitta.

This advice, “Father and Son Estranged,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in June 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/father-and-son-estranged

A wall hanging of the eight auspicious signs is available from the FPMT Foundation store:
https://shop.fpmt.org/Wall-Hanging–Auspicious-Symbols-_p_2055.html

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche walking to Dra Karpo temple, the holy site of Guru Rinpoche’s body in Pharo, Bhutan, June 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

A student was taking time off after serving at a center for ten years and was planning to do a walking retreat for several months. Lama Zopa Rinpoche offered this advice:

Yes, doing 200,000 Vajrasattva mantras as you walk is very good. You can do this as if you are making pilgrimage, and at the same time you can do a sort of retreat, like Vajrasattva, while you are walking. Also you can do things like refuge or reciting OM MANI PADME HUM and so forth.

Many years ago, His Holiness the Dalai Lama gave Chenrezig initiation and the commitment was 600,000 recitations of OM MANI PADME HUM. I met a very learned, expert monk in philosophy who had taken the initiation. He was making pilgrimage in Nepal and at the same time reciting OM MANI PADME HUM, the commitment he had received from His Holiness the Dalai Lama. He did this while he was travelling. Of course he was very busy at his monastery, reading texts, teaching and educating others, and learning himself. So he did the commitment immediately like this, with pilgrimage in Nepal.

Family, Bhutan, June 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

It’s incredible to use the time like this. It’s so profitable and meaningful, instead of complaining, “I can’t get it done. I don’t have time, blah, blah,” but at the same time having so much time for gossiping and many other things, like eating, drinkingand so forth.

Also during the walk or pilgrimage or while travelling, you can, for example, do lamrim meditation. It’s not always necessary to be in a room, sitting on a cushion and closing your eyes. You don’t always need to do that.

Dzongdrakha, place of Guru Rinpoche’s mind, Paro, Bhutan, June 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

You can follow the lamrim outline on guru devotion for however many months you are travelling. Meditate on guru devotion by following the outline, to develop from your side the realization that sees the guru as all the buddhas—one guru as all the buddhas and one buddha as all the gurus—until you are able to realize this from your side, without effort, stable.

Whenever you have this stable realization for weeks, months and years, for your whole life, then come all the realizations up to omniscience, including the three principal aspects of the path (the foundation) and tantra (the two stages) up to the omniscient mind. Then you can even achieve enlightenment in one life. You can achieve enlightenment quickly, in a brief lifetime of this degenerate time, like Gyalwa Ensapa, Chökyi Dorje, Milarepa and many others.

This advice, “Retreat While Walking or Traveling,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in May 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/retreat-while-walking-or-travelling

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Ven. Lobsang Konchok, and Ven. Thubten Tendar cooking dinner for a few students from Buddha House, Adelaide, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

In July 2016 Lama Zopa Rinpoche sent the following advice to a cook at a Dharma center:

The essence of the Mahayana teaching is to let go of the I and to cherish others who are numberless. Even by cherishing one sentient being, that brings enlightenment to you. That means you are able to free all sentient beings from the oceans of suffering and bring them to the peerless happiness, buddhahood—the total cessation of obscurations and completion of realizations.

That is why even if one insect falls in the water, to arise compassion and help that insect is so important. Or if an animal, such as an ant, is attacked by another animal, to help rescue it with compassion. Also to help even one person with problems, with suffering, for example, to help rescue someone or to help someone who is suicidal, to help them not to be suicidal.

It is said in the Chenrezig sutra Well-Condensed Dharma, that you don’t need to follow many Dharmas, only one, which is compassion. If you have compassion then the whole Buddhadharma comes, which means in your heart, all the understanding of the words and all the realizations. The conclusion is that if there is compassion you can achieve enlightenment. Without compassion, no enlightenment.

Ven. Sangpo making the chili for the potato pancakes, Vienna, Austria, September 2017. Photo by Markus Igel.

Relating to cooking, it is very important. As you know, cooking gives so much happiness to sentient beings. What I have heard from Kopan is that the food is very good and even if people don’t like the meditation course, they stay.

So that helps them and even if they do not understand the teachings or the meditations, they stay, and it leaves a positive imprint in their mind. Besides that, they achieve everlasting happiness, nirvana. This is one example related to the Kopan courses in Nepal or the Tushita courses in Dharamsala.

I like to make food for people because it pleases their mind very much. When you know how to make different food delicious, one of the greatest benefits is that you can invite your gurus and make food for them. They enjoy it and you collect the greatest merit and this becomes the greatest purification.

That means especially by pleasing the guru it becomes a quick way to achieve enlightenment. So many negative karmas get purified on the way. By making delicious food, you make the guru happy.

Ven. Lobsang Sherab making potato pancakes, Vienna, Austria, September 2017. Photo by Markus Igel.

Before you made the food offering you would be reborn in the hells but by offering food and pleasing the guru you will be reborn in the pure land, or at least have a perfect human body, meet Dharma and actualize the path, and then achieve enlightenment.

This benefit is not only relating to food, it’s anything that pleases the guru. Previously you would have been reborn in the lower realms, but if you please the guru you will be reborn in the pure realm, or become a human, become a monk. It changes from second to second, your whole karma changes your rebirth.

This is something you must keep in your heart and not forget. This is the way to make your life most meaningful.

This advice, “Cooking as Dharma Practice,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in April 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/cooking-dharma-practice

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche blessing a dog at Istituto Lama Tzong Khapa, Pisa, Italy, October 2017. Photo by Piero Sirianni.

A student wrote to Lama Zopa Rinpoche, asking if he should give his brother a large sum of money as requested to help a girl sold into prostitution. In his response Rinpoche advised the student to think of this payment as a past karmic debt and gave the following teaching on karma:

You should know that karma is definite, which means it definitely brings the result. From virtue the result is definitely happiness, and from nonvirtue the result is definitely suffering.

A suffering result now comes from non-virtue, if the non-virtue is not completely purified and if it hasn’t met the conditions that make it extinct. Similarly with virtue, [the result is happiness] if it’s not destroyed by heresy, anger and so forth.

The second outline of karma is that it is expandable. You have to know that by making charity just one time you will experience the result for many lifetimes, for many eons. This is what you have to really know, to recognize. Happiness is not just received one time from virtue and then it is finished. This is what many people may think, but it’s not correct. We experience the result for eons. We have to experience the result, happiness, for eons. Similarly, we experience suffering as a result of non-virtue. It’s not just one time that we experience it and it’s finished; we have to experience it for eons.

We have to understand that if the karma is not created then the result never happens. If the karma is created then the resultant suffering or happiness—whether great or small—never gets lost, even if it was created billions, zillions, trillions of years ago. We still have to experience the result of negative karma from billions, zillions, trillions of years ago, not just from this past life.

People wonder why in the beginning they have a beautiful body and then suddenly it becomes defective, or they have a lot of mental and physical suffering. So much unimaginable suffering happens, which could be from karma created numberless eons ago. People are very surprised, and they think, “Oh, I haven’t done bad things in this life, so why am I experiencing this now?” Most people think it is just [experienced in] one life. Maybe some people think of karma created from past lives, but most don’t think it can be karma created billions or zillions of eons ago, numberless eons ago. Most people don’t think like that.

In the Tengyur—the commentaries of the great pandits from Nalanda on the Buddha’s teachings in the Kangyur—the Buddha said:

Any sentient being who, during the period of my teachings,
Makes charity well (even if the material is the size of a hair)
For 80,000 eons there will be great results of great enjoyment:
No pain, no disease, and enjoyment of happiness.
Like that, one will be enriched with the desirable things.
At the end you can actually achieve the result—the peerless cessation and completion (enlightenment).

After hearing that there is the great result, who wouldn’t want to collect merit?

There is also a quote similar to this in the Arya Sanghata Sutra by the Buddha.

This advice, “Think of the Kindness of Sentient Beings,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in May 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/think-kindness-sentient-beings

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche enjoying lunch before a flight with Sangha members Ven. Lobsang Sherab, Ven. Topgye, Geshe Lhundup Tsundu, Ven. Thubten Tendar, and Ven. Holly Ansett, Delhi, India, February 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

In a short video clip from a teaching given at the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, Lama Zopa Rinpoche explains the benefits of living in vows.

Rinpoche teaches that taking vows is so powerful that it’s mentioned that right after taking vows, before they have degenerated, any prayers you make are fulfilled.

Whether one is a novice monk or nun with thirty-six vows, a fully ordained monk with 253 vows, a fully ordained nun, or a lay person holding vows such as the eight Mahayana precepts, Rinpoche emphasizes the importance of living in your vows: “For you it is unbelievable, unbelievable! Then for numberless sentient beings, if you dedicate with bodhichitta for sentient beings, wow, wow, wow!”

By keeping a larger number of vows, your prayers are even more powerful. Rinpoche explains that this is why people living in Buddhist countries like Sri Lanka, Thailand, and Myanmar ask monasteries and nunneries to do prayers and pujas for people who have died, are sick, and are experiencing difficulties in business and so forth. Rinpoche notes that people also ask the Tibetan monasteries and nunneries. 

“You see the difference, living in vows, which are such powerful objects,” Rinpoche says. “You understand the point. Then all these, it is unbelievable, so beneficial for sentient beings—even prayers and pujas, whatever you do—they are so powerful for sentient beings.”

“First you take the precepts, and as you take more and more precepts, you become more and more powerful for sentient beings. For sentient beings you are like Dzambala, bringing wealth and all the prayers for sentient beings. This happens because you are living in pure vows, taking higher ordination.”

“Because your prayers and pujas are so powerful, when sentient beings make offerings they collect so much merit. So it helps so much. It is so easy to have success for others, like Dzambala bringing success, wealth, and so forth.”

Rinpoche teaches that having a precious human rebirth, and especially if you are a member of the Sangha, then you must realize it is incredible and unbelievable how much you can benefit sentient being: “You should rejoice! You should enjoy your life! You should rejoice in your life all the time!”

By realizing the benefits, Rinpoche says, there is no room in your heart or mind for depression for even an hour or a minute; you are only full of joy.

Watch “Living in Vows Makes Your Life So Precious” on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/77QB_qjCDPQ

The quotes from Lama Zopa Rinpoche have been edited and are based on the unedited transcript of the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2016/

Find and watch video from all of Rinpoche’s recent teachings events, including from Chan Tong Chen Tong Centre in Tasmania and the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion in Bendigo, Australia:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche with the media team members Alexis, Tione, Ven. Rinchen, and Harald, Light of the Path retreat, August 2016. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

In this short video clip from a teaching given at the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, Lama Zopa Rinpoche urges us to liberate ourselves from samsara. Rinpoche instructs us that when our husband or wife meets somebody and has a relationship with that person, we have to remember the six shortcomings of samsara.

“There is nothing definite in samsara; the friend, enemy, stranger changes. In the morning they are a friend, in the evening an enemy, in the afternoon a friend, in the evening an enemy, today a friend, tomorrow an enemy, a friend this week, next week an enemy, this month a friend, next month enemy, this year friend, next year friend,” Rinpoche says.

Our relationship with that person also changes from life to life, and it has been like this from beginningless rebirths. Rinpoche says, “In beginningless samsara you have been friends, enemies, and strangers numberless times. You see, that is the nature of samsara.”

Rinpoche continues, “If you yourself are free from samsara then you don’t have to be attached. If you don’t have to be attached, then you don’t have to be angry. You are unattached. You don’t need it at all. You are totally free.”

Rinpoche then explains where we made our mistake. “Because you didn’t actualize the four noble truths, the true cause of suffering, true cessation, and the true path; because of that mistake, you are still in samsara; and torture yourself all the time,” he says. “I have to say it that way, otherwise it is just words, the lamrim is just words. It is really talking about life, so you need to practice.”

He recommends starting with renunciation and not thinking that the other person is torturing us: “No, think that it is your own problem because in the past life you didn’t actualize the path. In this life you didn’t actualize the path.”

Next, practice bodhichitta. “That sentient being is totally controlled by attachment. It is the same as being possessed by a spirit. You need to help them. As you meditate on kindness while walking, it is so important to help, to practice kindness.”

Then, reflect on emptiness. Rinpoche says, “All the rest is hallucination. There can be great peace when you think of hallucination. We don’t have to speak of tantra; just lamrim is amazing.”

Watch “The Six Shortcomings of Samsara” on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/t6J73iyuTxw

The quotes from Lama Zopa Rinpoche have been edited and are based on the unedited transcript of the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2016/

Find and watch video from all of Rinpoche’s recent teachings events, including from Chan Tong Chen Tong Centre in Tasmania and the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion in Bendigo, Australia:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche arriving at Buddha House, Adelaide, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

In this short video clip from a teaching given at the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, while explaining the meaning of a Tibetan phase, discusses the importance of studying one path well in order to avoid confusion and the degeneration of one’s wisdom.

“Keep your wisdom in the pure path,” Lama Zopa Rinpoche instructs. “Pure view, pure conduct, a subdued mind, wisdom.”

In order to do this, Rinpoche advises to not dilute and confuse your efforts by trying many types of teachings.

“You start this, then start this, start this, start this,” Rinpoche says with this hand gesturing in different directions. “Then your wisdom is not set in the best direction, best view, best conduct.”

You even become unsure and unclear about Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings, Rinpoche explains. When you try different things, “at the end you are lost, at the end you are not sure, you are confused.”

However, after studying well on one path and making sure that you have correct meditation, conduct, and view, Rinpoche says, then when you learn about other paths, due to that correct basis, you are able to understand, to recognize other methods and paths, and to be able to discriminate between them.

It is like going to a buffet at a restaurant and tasting all the different food. If you do that with the teachings, you could end up like someone for whom Lama Tsongkhapa’s teachings mean nothing.

“What is mediation, what is conduct, what is pure view—the real path,” Rinpoche warns that those things could mean nothing to you. “You are lost.”

Watch “Keep Your Wisdom with Pure View and Conduct” on YouTube:
https://youtu.be/i_Xr4CuIb00

The quotes from Lama Zopa Rinpoche have been edited and are based on the unedited transcript of the 2016 Light of the Path retreat, which you can find here with video recordings of the complete teachings:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/light-of-the-path-teachings-2016/

Find and watch video from all of Rinpoche’s recent teachings events, including from Chan Tong Chen Tong Centre in Tasmania and the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion in Bendigo, Australia:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Mahamudra, Adelaide, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche advised a student seeking life practice advice to make the most of their life by practicing lamrim and bodhicihtta, thereby bring as much benefit as possible to all sentient beings.

Practice lamrim and bodhichitta, so that everything you do is with the motivation of bodhichitta, in order to free numberless sentient beings from the oceans of samsaric sufferings and bring them to buddhahood, the peerless happiness. Think, “For that I have to achieve full enlightenment, therefore I am going to do this action with bodhichitta, whatever it is—going to work, eating, working, sleeping, and so forth.” Practice mindfulness as much as possible, like that. In this way all your activities, such as walking, sleeping, or doing your job, are done with bodhichitta. Then every action becomes the cause of enlightenment and you collect more than skies of merit.

For example, if you generate bodhichitta and then recite OM MANI PADME HUM one hundred and eight times, when you recite the mantras for numberless sentient beings you collect more than skies of merit and good luck with each mantra.

If you are going to the stupa to circumambulate, generate bodhichitta at the beginning, then each time you go around the stupa it becomes the cause of enlightenment and you collect more than skies of merit with each step.

The same thing when you go to the market with bodhichitta. Whether you are coming or going, everything you do, even sleeping, each minute you sleep becomes the cause of enlightenment and you collect more than skies of merit if these actions are done with bodhichitta.

That is my main advice. Whatever you do in this way, by generating bodhichitta, you benefit every single hell being, hungry ghost, and animal—all those in the ocean the size of a mountain and those beings that are the smallest size, like fleas; those that live on the ground, in the trees and in the sky—and also human beings, suras, asuras, and intermediate state beings, including every sentient being, there is not one left out. All your actions benefit every single sentient being.

This advice, “Whether to Remove Deity Tattoos,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in February 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/whether-remove-deity-tattoos

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Making offerings to monks during Losar at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, February 2017. Photo by Laura Miller.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche answered a student’s question about why monks receive offerings before nuns during pujas, and advised that if the student makes offerings to the pores of the guru then the student will collect the same merit as having offered to numberless buddhas, Dharma, Sangha, statues, stupas, and scriptures.

When making offerings to Sangha in pujas, generally people offer first to the monks and then to the nuns. Actually this is probably more a Tibetan custom, as in Tibet even the lay people do this. The women also do this; they always offer to the men first.

From my side, how I think is that you could offer to each monk and nun at the same time. So you could have two people making offerings to monks and nuns at the same time, down the two rows.

Probably you have not heard, but I am not sure. Anyway, when you are making offerings, whether to lay people or Sangha, if they have received teachings from His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and if they have the same guru as you—such as His Holiness the Dalai Lama or the center geshe—think that every one of the students is the pores of your guru. If you think that as you make offerings, then you collect unbelievable merit.

You collect more merit than having made offerings to numberless buddhas, Dharma, and Sangha, and numberless statues, stupas, and scriptures in the ten directions. You collect much more merit by thinking that they are the guru’s pores and then making the offering, even to lay people. Even giving a glass of water, a piece of fruit, a biscuit, or one nut to a lay person who is a disciple of His Holiness or the center geshe, who is also your guru. By thinking that this person is the guru’s pore and then offering one biscuit or one piece of candy, you collect much more merit than having made offerings to numberless buddhas, Dharma, Sangha, and numberless statues, stupas, and scriptures in the ten directions.

This is not just in a puja. This refers to any time.

That’s why I say at the centers, don’t think that to collect merit you always have to offer to the monasteries. You can collect so much merit at the center, right there, by offering to the students who have the same guru as you. However many students there are, you can make offerings to them, and you will collect the same merit as having offered to numberless buddhas, Dharma, Sangha, statues, stupas, and scriptures. There are so many students.

This advice, “Burning Holy Objects and Offering to Sangha,” is from “Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Online Advice Book,” published in March 2018 on the Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive website:
https://www.lamayeshe.com/advice/burning-holy-objects-and-offering-sangha

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Group photo with Bishop Leslie Rogers Tomlinson, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and Saint Francis of Assisi statue, Bendigo, Australia, May 2018. Photo courtesy of Owen Cole.

On May 12, 2018, as the Bodhicaryavatara and Rinjung Gyatsa Retreat with Lama Zopa Rinpoche drew to a close, some of the retreat participants were able to join in the unveiling and blessing of a new statue at the Peace Park outside of the retreat venue, The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion. Long-time Australian student Owen Cole shared this story of interfaith harmony in Bendigo, Australia:

The renunciation and compassion of Saint Francis of Assisi was acknowledged in the closing stages of the retreat in Bendigo with an interfaith blessing of a life-size statue of the famous twelfth-century Catholic monk.

Bishop Leslie Rogers Tomlinson and Lama Zopa Rinpoche with the statue of Saint Francis of Assisi, Bendigo, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

The statue is the first item to be placed in an interfaith Peace Park on the grounds of The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion. It will be joined by religious works from other faiths and was blessed by the Catholic Bishop of Sandhurst, Bishop Leslie Rogers Tomlinson, and Lama Zopa Rinpoche.

Bishop Tomlinson said Saint Francis, the patron saint of the environment and animals, through his life of simplicity and poverty invites us to look at our present-day culture of excessiveness.

Rinpoche, who has deep respect for the saint, said Saint Francis renounced attachment to the pleasures of this life and through his miracles, showed great spiritual attainment.

During his April 28 teaching at the retreat, Rinpoche talked about Saint Francis, saying, “Saint Francis wore ragged clothes, with many holes and patches, very similar to the Kadampa geshes, renounced practitioners. He was wearing ragged clothing, but his mind is actually the same as a bodhisattva.” 

Rinpoche went on to explain that just like the bodhisattvas who can stop floods, Saint Francis of Assisi stopped the water from flowing in Assisi so his disciples could meditate in silence.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche addressing the audience, Bendigo, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Rinpoche added, “We have in Tibet many statutes who spoke to great yogis or those who actualized bodhichitta, those who actualized the higher path, many in Tibet and Nepal, even in Solu Khumbu. Similarly, a picture of Jesus spoke to Saint Francis of Assisi.”

Watch Ven. Tenzin Tsultim’s video of the Unveiling of the St. Francis of Assisi statue:
https://youtu.be/mSyFsHBT51Q

Additions to the Peace Park will include an Ik Onkar, a 2-meter (6.5-foot) high character-symbol that represents a central tenet of Sikh philosophy, from the Sikh community; a 1.5-meter (5-foot) high mosaic from the Islamic Council of Victoria to be incorporated into an installation that recalls a story from the Quran; a statue of Ganesh from the Hindu community; a statue from The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and a representation from the local Aboriginal community.

Gathered for the interfaith blessing, Bendigo, Australia, May 2018. Photo courtesy of Ian Green’s Twitter page.

Ian Green, director of The Great Stupa, also spoke at the event, commenting that FPMT is establishing Buddhism in the West and, as Australia is a multicultural and new country, The Great Stupa should reflect that.

“Rinpoche and His Holiness the Dalai Lama both thought it was a good idea to use the stupa to foster interfaith harmony,” Ian said.

The statue of Saint Francis was sponsored by the Catholic Church and will remain their property but will be maintained by the stupa organization.

Artist Lucy Wang, who also contributed to the artwork inside The Great Stupa, painting the Saint Francis of Assisi statue, Bendigo, Australia, April 2018. Photo courtesy of The Great Stupa’s Instagram page.

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teachings from the Bodhicaryavatara and Rinjung Gyatsa Retreat in Australia:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/lama-zopa-rinpoche-teachings-in-bendigo-2018/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.

Offering tsog during long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

The six-week long Bodhicaryavatara (A Guide to the Bodhisattva’s Way of Life) and Rinjung Gyatsa Retreat at the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion in Bendigo, Australia, came to a conclusion on Saturday, May 12. Ven. Holly Ansett, executive assistant to FPMT CEO Ven. Roger Kunsang, and long-time Australian student Owen Cole shared their reports on the retreat:

Lama Zopa Rinpoche at the Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Bendigo, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Throughout the six-week Bodhicaryavatara and Rinjung Gyatsa Retreat with Lama Zopa Rinpoche, participants commented to each other that something special was going on, that this retreat was unique, profound, and very precious. In other words, all the conditions had come together for deep and transforming practice. 

One long-time student speaking about the retreat told Owen Cole that “the ground shifted.”

“By that they meant that even though many of the long-time students who attended the retreat had heard the information conveyed in the teachings before, this time the message penetrated deeper,” Owen wrote.

Rinpoche himself remarked at the end of the retreat that everything went well and had been extremely harmonious and peaceful.

One of the reasons for this, Rinpoche said, was that all the retreat participants did Lama Chöpa Jorcho practice for several hours every morning exactly the way that Rinpoche had instructed.

Earlier in the retreat, Rinpoche had said there was no rush in doing the practice. So for six weeks, participants, led by the beautiful voice of Ven. Thubten Dechen, chanted the tunes—slowly, melodically, and mostly in Tibetan—just as Rinpoche had indicated.

Doing it this way, Rinpoche said, “softened the mind” and created the beneficial conditions.

A giant Tara thangka painted by Peter Iseli hung in The Great Stupa during the retreat. One day Rinpoche taught on the importance of very large thangkas, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Sangha pose for a group photo after a lunch in the Stupa Cafe offered by Rinpoche to Sangha, Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

During the last two weeks of the retreat, Rinpoche gave a Heruka initiation over several days. Rinpoche also gave five initiations from the Rinjung Gyatsa set of 305 initiations and a Lama Tsongkhapa long life initiation for Ven. Thubten Gyatso, a senior student and director of the nearby Thubten Shedrup Ling Monastery.

Rinpoche gave an unprecedented number of teachings during the retreat, all of which were streamed live online and are now available to watch as streaming video.

Rinpoche’s experiential teachings covered lamrim topics, emphasizing correctly following the guru in thought and action, and bodhichitta.

Rinpoche’s concluding teaching for the retreat, on May 11, was on the Twelve Links of Dependent Origination—a teaching he had received from Geshe Sopa Rinpoche—and the meaning of the popular Wheel of Life image.

After the concluding teaching, a deeply felt thank you mandala was offered to Rinpoche.

Ven. Gyatso and Ian Green, director of The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, spoke on behalf of the Heart of Wisdom board, which was the body responsible for organizing the retreat. They acknowledged the contributions and hard work of their fellow board members, including Ruby Karmay, director of Atisha Centre, which is located adjacent to The Great Stupa. 

Ven. Tenzin Tsapel, who coordinated the spiritual program for the retreat following all of Rinpoche’s wishes, was also thanked. The retreat coordinator, Ven. Losang Dorje, was praised for the excellent work he did organizing all of the details and offered a round of applause. Ian gave a brief summary report of the retreat’s expenses. 

Ven. Dorje then thanked all the volunteer teams—gompa, office, and grounds and maintenance— that allowed retreat participants to focus on practice without worry of other things. The transcription work of Ven. Joan Nicell and the work of the live interpreters were also acknowledged. In addition many, many others not named here were thanked.

At one point during the retreat, Rinpoche commented to Ven. Roger Kunsang that these teachings on Bodhicaryavatara and the Rinjung Gyatsa initiations are extremely important for the FPMT organization.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Ian Green looking at a model of the master plan for The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion and grounds. Rinpoche and Ian met many times during the retreat to discuss sacred art for the stupa and future development. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

During the afternoon of May 11, a large Saint Francis of Assisi statue was unveiled in the Peace Park on the grounds of The Great Stupa. Rinpoche and the Catholic Bishop of Sandhurst, Bishop Leslie Rogers Tomlinson, blessed the statue. 

Meanwhile retreat participants cleaned and decorated the gompa inside The Great Stupa in preparation for the following day’s long life puja for Rinpoche.

Students in the fourth week of the Bendigo Retreat who attended the 1978 November Kopan Course forty years ago. Owen Cole wrote, “In those days, many of us slept on the ground in a tent and had to take a bucket down to the local freezing Nepali spring in winter to bathe, but the Kopan courses in those days were an exhilarating experience for us all as they have been for the thousands who have attended them since.” From left, Gun Cisse (Sweden), Geoff Pullen (UK), Vicki Taylor (Sydney), Murray Wright (New Zealand), Owen Cole (Hayagriva), Kyabje Lama Zopa Rinpoche, Greg Carr (Hayagriva), Margaret Bohler (Sydney). Absent Ven. Thubten Gyatso. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.

The retreat was attended by a cross section of FPMT students, traveling from near and far, including more than sixty-five ordained Sangha.

“Ninety students did the whole six-week retreat with almost four hundred taking part for at least part of it. There was an average of about 160 students in any week with about one-third of those from outside Australia,” Owen Cole wrote.

“Organizing the retreat involved creating a small village from nothing by setting up sixty accommodation tents as well as caravans, portable toilets and showers, a marquee (tent) dining hall, and a portable kitchen. Electricity for the kitchen came from a portable generator and with the number of people and lack of infrastructure, drinking water even had to be trucked into the site and sewage trucked out.

“The karma yoga with participants having to cooperate and get to know each other through jobs such as maintaining the altar, serving food, dish washing, cleaning toilets and showers, and ground maintenance also built a sense of community. Without this huge input of volunteer labor the retreat could not have happened.”

The Great Stupa and marquee, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim.

Tents set up for retreat participants at The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Owen Cole.

The Long Life Puja

More than four hundred people attended the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche on Saturday, May 12, at The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion.

Resident geshes from FPMT Australia centers were there, including Geshe Thubten Rapten (Thubten Shedrup Ling), Geshe Phuntsok Tsultrim (Chenrezig Institute), Geshe Ngawang Samten (Vajrayana Institute), Geshe Lobsang Doga (Tara Institue), and Geshe Ngawang Sonam (Hayagriva Centre). Geshe Jampa Tharchin, resident geshe at Chandrakirti Centre in New Zealand, was also there, as well as Geshe Tenzin Zopa, an FPMT touring geshe who attended the entire retreat.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche during the long life puja for him, The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 12, 2018. Photo by Ven. Tenzin Tsultrim.

Students carrying in the White Tara statue offered to Rinpoche during the long life puja, The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

Rinpoche entered the carefully arranged gompa to gracefully falling white flower petals.

During the puja, which lasted six hours, Rinpoche was offered a White Tara statue, sculpted by Bertrand Cayla over a period of a year and painted by Sonam Sherpa and Bertrand over a period of several months at Nalanda Monastery in France. The life-sized statute was shipped to Bendigo and filled by Geshe Thubten Rapten and Ven. Gyatso.

Vens. Thubten Dechen and Gyalten Wangmo offered the long life prayer to Rinpoche composed by Rangjung Neljorma Khadro Namsel Drönme (Khadro-la), masterfully sung to a Bhutanese tune. As they sang, it seemed as if sunlight illuminated the statue, creating an auspicious and touching moment.

Vens. Dechen and Gyalten offer long life prayer by Khadro-la to Lama Zopa Rinpoche, The Great Stupa of Universal Compassion, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

White Tara statue in France before being sent to Australia to be offered to Rinpoche. Photo by Bertrand Cayla.

Student strongly participated in the long life puja, singing from their hearts and receiving the blessings from Rinpoche.

After the puja, Rinpoche invited seventy-five people to lunch in a Nepali restaurant in Bendigo. Rinpoche offered the lunch as a way of showing appreciation to the people who have taken on important responsibilities at FPMT centers, including resident geshes and teachers, directors, spiritual program coordinators, board members, and so forth. It was a happy and relaxed time at the restaurant.

The next day before leaving Thubten Shedrup Ling, where he stayed during the retreat, Rinpoche led an incense puja in the garden of the monastery. Rinpoche traveled next to Adelaide, where he blesses Buddha House’s new building on May 20.

Lama Zopa Rinpoche doing incense puja at Thubten Shedrup Ling, Australia, May 2018. Photo by Ven. Lobsang Sherab.

 “It was an incredible and moving retreat,” Ven. Holly said. “It was not like anything else I’ve experienced. It was such a precious time. The conditions of prayers and effort came together for a retreat of a life time.”

Watch Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s teachings from the Bodhicaryavatara and Rinjung Gyatsa Retreat in Australia:
https://fpmt.org/media/streaming/teachings-of-lama-zopa-rinpoche/lama-zopa-rinpoche-teachings-in-bendigo-2018/

Lama Zopa Rinpoche is the spiritual director of the Foundation for the Preservation of Mahayana Tradition (FPMT), a Tibetan Buddhist organization dedicated to the transmission of the Mahayana Buddhist tradition and values worldwide through teaching, meditation, and community service.