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Volunteer training course class taught by Alexandra Mejia at Centro Nagarjuna Madrid, Spain, February 2019. Photo courtesy of Alexandra Mejia.
La Asociacion Potala Hospice (Potala Hospice Association) is one of FPMT’s hospice services offering service to the community during the COVID pandemic. Community Service is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Alexandra Mejia, coordinator, shares the story.
La Asociacion Potala Hospice began its journey in December 2000, one month after a group of students had the opportunity to meet Lama Zopa Rinpoche on Tenerife, one of the Canary Islands. Rinpoche told me it would be good to organize a group of people at Nagarjuna C.E.T. Madrid, an FPMT center, who were interested in the subject of death so we could accompany and support people who are dying. Rinpoche advises me to learn everything I could from the work done by Ven. Thubten Pende (Ken Hawter), founder of Karuna Hospice Service, an FPMT project in Queensland, Australia. This is how, under the inspiration and advice of our precious Lama Zopa Rinpoche, we began to meet once a week. In May 2003, we became a registered nonprofit organization in Spain. Our organization’s name was given to us by our dear Rinpoche.
La Asociacion Potala Hospice board members Jose Enrique Parra, Leticia Bonon, Alexandra Mejia, Andreu Stany, Iago Carbonell, and Isabel Picaso meeting on Zoom, April 2021. Photo by Alexandra Mejia.
In 2007, we signed a collaboration agreement with Hestia Hospital in Madrid to accompany patients in the palliative care unit. Since then, hundreds of people have become La Asociacion Potala Hospice volunteers and have completed one of the training courses we periodically offer. Our organization continues to grow. We formed a volunteer group in Valencia in November 2019 and a group in Barcelona in December 2020.
Our organization’s main function has been face-to-face volunteering. The volunteer plays an important role in hospitals, and their work is well-recognized, accepted, and appreciated among hospital staff. Illness from disease creates a situation that favors the emergence of questions in the human mind. The tedious hours spent hospitalized, the beginning of gradual and irrecoverable losses, the difficult encounter with fragility and dependence on others, the feelings of powerlessness that follow, and the senselessness of suffering raise questions connected with our spiritual dimension. Our physical needs to eat, sleep, drink, and breathe are normally satisfied by objects, but a person’s spiritual needs can only be satisfied by another human being. Our need for affection, contact, respect, reconciliation, and hope can never be satisfied by a machine, drug, or concept. Volunteers, through their presence and support, help the sick find hope.
Zoom volunteer training class on how to offer telephone support during COVID, May 2020. Photo by Iago Carbonell.
Our volunteers are people who, through their own motivation of solidarity, sought out training to develop the knowledge, skills, and attitudes they need to accompany the patient at the end of life. When COVID broke out, our volunteers were engaged in this work in Madrid, Valencia, and Barcelona, and we had plans to begin collaborating with new institutions. However, due to COVID, volunteering is not allowed in the hospitals in Spain.
We reinvented our activities so we can continue with our main objective, which is to accompany people in their suffering through illnesses and death. In 2020, we maintained cohesion among our volunteers by training them to offer telephone support for people affected by COVID. We met weekly by Zoom during the months of April, May, and June. We wanted to maintain communication between ourselves and support each other, while also continuing to train ourselves through participation in workshops on the subject of death, dying, and accompaniment.
While hospitals are still closed to volunteers, we continue to help the community by offering workshops on death via Zoom to the FPMT Hispana community. We also increased our social media presence, launching a Facebook page and Instagram account to share helpful content.
To learn more about La Asociacion Potala Hospice, visit their website:
https://www.potalahospiceluzclara.org/en-au
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama with Naresh Mathur. Photo courtesy of the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
We are saddened to share the news that Naresh Sahai Mathur passed away at the age of 67, in New Delhi, India, on April 25, 2021, of COVID-19. Naresh was an early student of FPMT founders Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and a long-time FPMT volunteer. Kabir Saxena, also a long-time FPMT student who currently serves as the spiritual program coordinator at Tushita Mahayana Meditation Centre in New Delhi, wrote a personal remembrance of Naresh to share with the international FPMT community.
By Kabir Saxena
With the recent untimely passing away of Naresh Mathur—another victim of the second murderous wave of COVID-19—the Indian Buddhist sangha, his friends worldwide, as well as the Tibetan community, have lost an invaluable supporter, legal advisor, and much beloved friend.
Naresh was born in Old Delhi in 1954, close to where some twenty-five years later the pioneers of Tushita Mahayana Meditation Centre would be living. It’s a testimony to his great intellectual and spiritual thirst that he was willing and able to seek beyond his quality education in sociology and law at two of Delhi’s esteemed establishments and find himself at the doors of both Tushita Mahayana Meditation Centre and Tibet House in Delhi.
While the practice of law provided his bread and butter, it was Buddhist studies that quickly established their prominence in Naresh’s heart and mind. Early on he had the great good fortune to receive personal, one-on-one teachings on lamrim and Madhyamaka from the renowned Geshe Palden Drakpa, who became a lifelong friend of the family and a recipient of Naresh’s generous medical help. It was, I believe, this deep experience of the teachings with Geshe-la that made Naresh a lifelong proponent of the sublime Nalanda parampara (tradition), with its emphasis on the guru-disciple relationship, logical inquiry, and debate. It was to these teachings that Naresh returned again and again; even in the last decade of his life, he was an important part of the core group of students at Geshe Dorji Damdul’s Tibet House Nalanda Masters Course.
Naresh was a lover of knowledge, a philosopher in the true sense of the word, and all his life he combined that with his work as a lawyer in the High and Supreme Courts in Delhi.
Naresh Mathur
When I first met him in 1980, he was a bright and extremely handsome young man, much impressed by his contact with Lama Thubten Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche. Naresh went on to be a director of Tushita Mahayana Meditation Centre, an organizer of the Dharma Celebrations with His Holiness the Dalai Lama in Delhi, and the creator of Root Institute for Wisdom Culture’s Trust Deed in 1984 in Bodhgaya. He remained a trustee until a few months before his death.
His dedication to the cause of bringing the Dharma back to Indian people was profound and lasting. He participated in the teachings His Holiness gave to small groups of Indian students in the early 1980s and despite his heavy workload would, almost thirty years later, travel to Bodhgaya for the weekends to give teachings in Hindi to local students.
Naresh unstintingly helped the Tibetan cause with his legal talents and the list of his efforts on their behalf would be too long to include here. As an example, it was largely due to his legal actions that the Tibetan Colony of Majnu Ka Tila in Delhi was saved from destruction. Tenzin Geyche Tethong, former secretary to His Holiness, recalled how he had known Naresh since 1980 and how he greatly admired his interest in and knowledge of Buddhism, and also appreciated Naresh’s contribution to the Dalai Lama Trust of which he was a trustee.
In addition to his connection with Lama Yeshe, Lama Zopa Rinpoche, and FPMT, Naresh had a close connection with Dzongsar Jamyang Khyentse Rinpoche and his Deer Park Institute in Bir, as well as with Samdhong Rinpoche, whose Gandhian vision, critique of modernity, and Dharma advice were like nectar for Naresh.
Naresh was a lover of the meditative dhrupad style of Indian classical music, and we also spent many happy moments listening to Bob Dylan together. He could also be quite mischievous, and we would especially enjoy making silent and secret fun of speakers at conferences whom we considered not up to the mark.
He was a practitioner, especially of the Madhyamaka and the Kalachakra, and was increasingly drawn to extended practice in the last year of his life, according to his wife, Antonella. Throughout his life he had inspired and encouraged a younger generation of students by his example.
For me, and I am sure for many others, including his dear circle of Italian and international friends, Naresh was like family. His deep soulful eyes were those of the eternal seeker and lover; they grabbed you. My father, to whom Naresh was very loving and generous, used to say that going by Naresh’s piercing gaze, he was always in a state of otherworldly intoxication!
In his last year, during long walks together in the woods near his home in south Delhi, Naresh would always steer the conversation to the Dharma, the importance of a grounding in lamrim, and his great love and obsession: the presentation of emptiness in the Gelug tradition. Despite his allegiance to many lamas of different schools of Tibetan Buddhism, he always seemed to be happily and no doubt karmically tethered to the pole of Lama Tsongkhapa’s works and Geshe Palden Dragpa’s teachings.
His Holiness the Dalai Lama with Naresh Mathur. Photo courtesy of the Office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama.
After his passing, His Holiness the Dalai Lama made the encouraging pronouncement that Naresh was his disciple, that we should not worry, and that he would take a good rebirth and would remember this life of his. The passing of this kind-hearted and generous man, still somewhat unreal and unbelievable to some of us, leaves a big void in many lives. Naresh is survived by his wife, Antonella, a gifted healer; daughter, Mudita, a talented graphic designer; and son, Atisha, a profound, upcoming teacher of the Dharma, especially of Buddhist logic, the subject matter his dear departed father so admired and communicated so readily to those fortunate enough to cross his path.
The FPMT India community organized a moving online prayer meeting and memorial for Naresh Mathur on May 5, 2021, with Naresh’s family and many long-time students around the world joining in. You can watch the two-hour recording of the Zoom call:
https://www.facebook.com/1652241455007411/videos/457118005515720/?__so__=channel_tab&__rv__=all_videos_card
For more on practices recommended by Lama Zopa Rinpoche at time of death and other resources to support yourself and loved ones at time of death, please visit fpmt.org/death/.
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Geshe Palden Sangpo, Sandy Carlson, Paul Krebbs, David Strevel, Joey Gooch, and Elise Strevel with the Little Free Pantry at Kadampa Center, Raleigh, North Carolina, US, January 2021. Photo collage by Sandy Carlson.
Kadampa Center, an FPMT center in Raleigh, North Carolina, US, created a Little Free Pantry to offer food and other items to people in need. Community Service is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Sandy Carlson, Kadampa Center board of directors president and volunteer, shares the story.
“Give what you can, take what you need”—this is the mantra of the Little Free Pantry. Nestled between two bushy evergreen trees, the bright red box at Kadampa Center invites any passerby to open its door and find what they need, whether it’s food, toiletries, or paper goods.
Little Free Pantry at Kadampa Center, Raleigh, North Carolina, US, March 2021. Photo by Sandy Carlson.
The Little Free Pantry is a movement of neighbors helping neighbors. It’s about people reaching out to others, town by town, throughout the world. Following the idea of Street Libraries, Little Free Pantries offers items to meet basic human needs, accessible to everyone all the time, no questions asked.
The current pandemic, with the economic stresses that accompany it, inspired members of the Kadampa Center community to create our own Little Free Pantry. Filled with cans, jars, and boxes of food, it not only helps our neighbors, but also allows our members to practice loving kindness, compassion, and generosity.
Already, after only a few months, we have seen evidence that we are fulfilling a need for the food and toiletries that pass through our new Little Free Pantry, even though we are not physically open for classes.
The pantry arose through the help of many people who brainstormed the best location (keeping in mind discretion, visibility, and awareness of the exposure to sun and weather), provided carpentry work (remodeling a used kitchen cabinet from Habitat for Humanity), and painted and placed the pantry when it was ready.
One of our FPMT resident teachers, Geshe Palden Sangpo, performed a beautiful blessing, and he has started painting mantras in the pantry. Geshe Sangpo also donated the very first items of food.
Watch the four-minute video “Geshe Sangpo Blessing Little Free Pantry” on the Media Kadampa Center YouTube channel:
https://youtu.be/slP9rKi3-C8
We so appreciate all our members who helped bring this awesome project to life: Elise and David Strevel, Diane Meyer, Paul Krebbs, Joey Gooch, and Sandy Carlson. We also send much love and appreciation for those in our community who continue to keep our Little Free Pantry full of items for anyone in need. This truly is compassion in action.
To learn more about Kadampa Center, visit their website:
https://kadampa-center.org/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Rinpoche offering incense puja at Kopan Monastery, Nepal, May 2021. Rinpoche is offering these pujas to help all those suffering due to COVID-19, particularly all those in India, Nepal (including in Kopan Monastery and Nunnery), and throughout the world.
As we shared last week, there has been a COVID-19 outbreak at Kopan Monastery and Nunnery in Nepal. The latest information from Kopan is that unfortunately more people at Kopan Monastery have tested positive for COVID. Currently, there are four Kopan monks in the hospital in Kathmandu with COVID-19.
One of those monks is Geshe Thubten Sherab, the FPMT resident teacher at Thubten Norbu Ling Tibetan Buddhist Center in Santa Fe, New Mexico, US, who is in Nepal. Geshe Sherab was taken to the hospital in order to have oxygen available to help with his COVID-related breathing difficulties. Geshe Sherab talked with Ven. Roger Kunsang earlier today and Geshe Sherab says he is not needing oxygen at this time and is doing better. Many FPMT centers and regional and national offices—including Thubten Norbu Ling and FPMT Australia—are organizing prayers for Geshe Sherab and Kopan Sangha.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche is continuing in isolation at Kopan Monastery. Rinpoche is still in good health and has been continuing to offer incense and other pujas to help the situation with COVID-19 in India, Nepal (including at Kopan), and the rest of the world.
The Kopan community would like students to know that they are committed to keeping each other as safe as possible and are so appreciative of everyone’s good wishes and prayers. As we mentioned in our previous blog on this situation, Kopan is requesting that the monastery not be contacted at this time unless there is an emergency.
Thanks to so many of the FPMT family who are continuing to keep all at Kopan Monastery and Khachoe Ghakyil Nunnery, as well everyone affected by the pandemic, in their prayers.
You can find Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s advice for this critical time on our Resources for the Coronavirus Pandemic page.
Watch videos from the series Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s Teachings on Thought Transformation during the Time of COVID-19 and find links to videos in transcripts, MP3s, additional practice advice, and more:
https://fpmt.org/fpmt/announcements/resources-for-coronavirus-pandemic/advice-from-lama-zopa-rinpoche-for-coronavirus/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Here’s a short excerpt of the story that looks at how centers moved their Dharma programs online last year:
“For center directors, it quickly became clear that many things that had been done in the center’s gompa could be moved online.
“Paula [de Wijs, director of Maitreya Instituut in the Netherlands] writes, ‘For years we had discussed doing more on the internet or through YouTube but had never really managed to put these ideas into practice. The expertise and equipment were not available and there was no real need to acquire either of them. Although many of us had used Zoom or other virtual meeting sites to attend meetings with people internationally, we had never considered holding teachings and meditations through such a medium. Suddenly this possibility became a necessity and we were able to continue the meditations and teachings without a break. That was a great relief on that score, since making the teachings of the Buddha accessible to people is our raison d’être: it is why we exist.’
“Center staff around the world studied and mastered Zoom and began to stream most of their regular teachings online. ‘I was amazed and impressed by how quickly this happened!’ Drolkar McCallum, who is the FPMT regional coordinator for North America, commented in April [2020].
“With the shift to online, some centers were seeing larger audience for their teachings. For example, Land of Joy in the UK, hosted an online retreat with Paula Chichester that had 130 participants.
“Mauricio Roa, who serves as the regional coordinator for Latin America, reported, ‘Centers who were used to having only a few members at classes, teachings, retreats, etc., multiplied their number of participants with their online offerings.’ Mauricio shared an example of a class given by Ven. Robina Courtin, teaching from the United States, offered through Centro Shiwa Lha in Brazil, which had 600 participants. Centers also started hosting retreats online. Some centers created different options for attending retreats, allowing different levels of participation. This flexibility also made it possible for more people to attend. And because of all the shut downs, some students reported that they found they were able to go deeper with their practices at home.“
Read the complete story in “Centers, Projects, and Services during the Pandemic: Turning a Difficult Situation into a Positive Result.”
Read more from Mandala 2021.
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche with Monica Hung, Aptos, California, US, 2016. Photo courtesy of Monica Hung.
Tse Chen Ling, the FPMT center in San Francisco, California, US, has expanded their offerings with a new class. Ven. Carol Corradi, center director, and Monica Hung, interpreter and teacher, share the story.
In March 2020, our center embarked in a new direction with “What Is Buddhism,” a class offered in Mandarin with staff member Monica Hung. The class met an hour each week until the COVID-19 epidemic forced closure of the center. Soon after, the class regrouped and moved to an online format via Zoom.
Most of the students in the class are originally from China and grew up with no experience of Tibetan Buddhism. Their understanding of Buddhism in general is a cultural one, mostly of temples and a tradition of making offerings without any practice or doctrinal aspects.
The “What Is Buddhism” class was born out of a Chinese New Year event sponsored by our center in 2020. We celebrated Chinese New Year with an Open House at the center with some traditional sweets and a chance for visitors to offer incense. Visitors could also sponsor special light offerings for family, friends, and loved ones who had passed away. Besides fostering a more cordial connection with the neighborhood, individual conversations lead to some questions about Tibetan Buddhism. Those conversations sparked the idea for this class.
Monica shared that she presents a broad overview of Tibetan culture and history. This helps students understand the background of Tibetan Buddhism. She also provides a basic introduction to Buddhist terminology. The class is conducted in a discussion-like style. The casual environment encourages students to feel free to ask any kind of question about Tibetan Buddhism. Some examples are “As a Buddhist do I need to become a vegetarian?” and “Can lamas marry?”
Each class opens with the group reading the Heart Sutra together and then doing about three minutes of meditation on the breath.
One of the students recently asked about the meaning of the Heart Sutra. This became an opportunity for Monica to play His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s teaching on the Heart Sutra, which originally aired online in January 2021. The class watched the video together. Monica paused it periodically to explain some of the more advanced terminology for them. This has become part of the regular class with Monica and the students watching His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s online teaching, discussing, and slowly moving through the complete teaching over several classes.
Monica plans to begin introducing the students to the lamrim teachings in the spring of 2021. Our center is looking at ways to publicize the class locally, hoping to make the class more widely available to our Chinese-speaking neighbors.
To learn more about Tse Chen Ling, visit their website:
https://www.tsechenling.org/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Masks and instructions delivered to Vozes da Comunidades in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, March 2021. Photo by Selma Souza.
In March 2021, Centro Shiwa Lha, the FPMT center in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, began facilitating the distribution of high quality face masks and instructions to the nonprofit organizations Instituto Floriano Peçanha dos Santos, Vozes da Comunidades, and Apadrinhe um sorriso in Rio de Janeiro, and the parish of Brazilian Catholic priest Padre Júlio Lancellotti. They did this as Brazil’s COVID-19 crisis continues to worsen. The PFF2 masked that were distributed are similar to other high quality face masks sold in various parts of the world (such as the N95, FFP2, KN95, P2, and DS2). Community service is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Ven. Tenzin Namdrol, center director, shares the story of how Centro Shiwa Lha has offered help during this ongoing crisis.
Masks and instructions delivered to Instituto Floriano Peçanha dos Santos in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, March 2021. Photo by Thalita Garcia.
The purpose of the Masks for All campaign was to donate face masks to people who cannot afford the PFF2 models, the face mask sold in Brazil that really provides security. People received donated masks and material with instructions on how to put them on, remove them, and reuse them without lessening their effectiveness.
The campaign began with one practitioner who wanted to donate around 2,000 face masks, and from there many others joined.
We offered a total of 4,020 masks to three nonprofit organizations in Rio de Janeiro as well as to Father Julio Lancelloti who supports people who live on the streets in São Paulo city. The company that sold us the masks was inspired by our campaign and offered forty liters (eleven gallons) of alcohol gel for hand sanitizing to the nonprofit organizations.
We thank all of the donors who have given us this opportunity to serve the community at such a crucial time.
To learn more about Centro Shiwa Lha, visit their website:
https://shiwalha.org.br/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Online Sutrathon by Aryatara Institut, March 2021. Photo by Alex Volk.
Aryatara Institut, the FPMT center in Munich, Germany, held a twenty-four hour Online Sutrathon to thank the individuals who donated to the center in February 2021 during the Fifteen Days of Miracles. Sabine Kehl, a long-term member of the center who translates for the center, shares the story.
In 2021, as we do every year during the Fifteen Days of Miracles—starting on Losar and ending on Chotrul Duchen—our center held a fundraising campaign. We gave friends and supporters the opportunity to accumulate merit in the form of generosity. Generosity is one of the six paramitas, one of the practices of the six perfections. By practicing generosity and donating to the center, students can contribute to the preservation of Aryatara Institut and the spreading of the Dharma.
We received an incredible grand total of €8,773.82 (US$10,511) from sixty donors. Please rejoice with us!
We expressed our gratitude with an Online Sutrathon. Beginning on Friday, March 5, at 4 p.m., thirteen people recited the Sanghata Sutra nonstop for twenty-four hours. The group, which consisted of members of our board of directors and friends of our center, recited the Sanghata Sutra by taking turns every hour. Anyone could join the Online Sutrathon by reading along live via Zoom or following the Online Sutrathon via YouTube livestream.
The Online Sutrathon began on Friday with a motivation and ended on Saturday afternoon with a dedication of the merits. We dedicated the merits we created for the sake of all sentient beings.
We managed eight full recitations! It was a wonderful and heartwarming experience to be able to offer a big “Thank you” as a community to our donors in this way while also creating great benefit for all sentient beings. We rejoice!
For more information about Aryatara Institut, visit their website:
https://aryatara.de/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
The grapple skidder carefully pulling trees out to the landing at Milarepa Center, Barnet, Vermont, US, December 2020. Photo by Dawn Holtz.
Dawn Holtz with the first cut of timber from the project at Milarepa Center, Barnet, Vermont, US, December 2020. Photo by Jackie Verley.
Milarepa Center, the FPMT center located on 275 forested acres in Barnet, Vermont, US, is working on a project to improve forest health, encourage tree growth, maintain wildlife habitats, and re-establish walking trails with help from foresters Mathias Nevins and Ryan Kilborn, Meadowsend Timberlands, Ltd., and H.B. Logging. Trees cut during the project and sold in a timer sale generated income that will help sustain Milarepa Center during the COVID pandemic. Dawn Holtz, center director, shares the story.
Milarepa Center has successfully completed an almost two-year long forest regeneration project. We are happy to report that all has gone very well and we are quite pleased with the results.
The project began in early 2019, by first creating a very specific, goal-oriented, ten-year forest plan. The forest and trails were then flagged for access and protection of sensitive areas. Equipment was moved in, and active cutting began in December 2020.
The final close-out of the project will take place in May and June 2021. The crew will return to give a final rake to trails. Log landing areas and stream-crossings will be brushed so water can flow through them properly.
Ven. Lhundub Chodron helping with the incense puja at Milarepa Center, Barnet, Vermont, US, December 2020. Photo by Dawn Holtz.
Spiritual preparations were also made for the start of the active cutting phase of the project. A Milarepa Center member who is residing and studying at Nalanda Monastery, an FPMT monastery in France, sponsored a Tara puja. The monks at Nalanda Monastery offered the Tara puja on behalf of Milarepa Center to help clear obstacles during the project.
In addition, Ven. Lhundub Chodron—who has held various positions within FPMT, including serving as director at differnt times of FPMT retreat center Land of Calm Abiding, Lotsawa Rinchen Zangpo Translator Program, and International Mahayana Institute (IMI), as well as serving as a past member of the FPMT, Inc. Board of Directors—happened to be in Vermont the day before the cutting began. Ven. Lhundub Chodron joined in offering an incense puja in order to pacify the many nagas and “landlords” at Milarepa Center.
I worked with a local forester to design the forest plan and lay out the goals for the Milarepa Center forest. They include achieving long-term growth and health of the forest; maintaining fresh water streams flowing throughout the land; protecting existing wildlife habitats and creating new ones; keeping the forest from encroaching on healthy, viable open land; and continuing overall sustainable management of the land and its many resources.
The project focused on an approximately 65-acre parcel of the 275-acre Milarepa Center forest. We implemented a prescribed tree cutting that was laid out in the forest management plan. By cutting down some trees we were able to open the tree canopy and allow sunlight to shine into the forest. This promotes overall forest regeneration within designated areas of the forest. Walking trails were also re-established in the forest as part of the project.
We had hoped to invite students and members out to walk and visit during the project, but due to COVID-19 were unable to. With that in mind, we digitally documented the project. Our forester Ryan Kilborn kindly agreed to help us film what we had hoped to share in person! The video we made will also be used as an educational tool by Meadowsend Timberlands, Ltd., a company that manages private land for landowners. They will use it to show viewers the process and value of good forest management practices adopted by landowners.
Watch the seven-minute video “Milarepa Center Forest Regeneration & Timber Sale Project” on Milarepa Center’s YouTube channel:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JRyjZn_tKgs
To learn more about Milarepa Center, visit their website:
https://www.milarepacenter.org/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Door of donated ambulance with the message “Con il contributo del Centro Tara Cittamani” (“With the contribution of Tara Cittamani Center”) outside of Palazzo Moroni, Comune di Padova (city hall) during the press conference, Padova, Italy, December 2020. Photo by Marco Parolin.
Centro Tara Cittamani, the FPMT center in Padova, Italy, completed several community service projects in 2020. Community service is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Marco Parolin, center director, and Teresa Fabris, spiritual program coordinator, share the story.
Our center, established in 1994, is located in the northeastern part of Italy. Despite the fact that people in this area have a strong connection with the Catholic Church (or maybe because of it), many attend our weekend Dharma teachings and meditation classes. We can count on a membership of 300 to 400 people every year, and with a little help from activities like yoga classes, we manage to keep our financial resources in a good balance.
Father Marco Putin and Marco Parolin at the monastery next to Santuario di San Leopoldo Mandic (Saint Leopoldo Mandic Sanctuary), Padova, Italy, October 2020. Photo by Teresa Fabbris.
Things have been a little easier in the past few years, thanks to the fact that by law Italians donate eight percent of their annual income tax return to a church of their choice or the government’s social assistance programs. As of a few years ago people can donate to Buddhists through the Italian Buddhist Union. The association ensures each Buddhist center’s status.
Our center can submit projects to the Italian Buddhist Union. Once approved, our center can receive up to seventy percent of the budget. In 2018, the first year we were able to receive money, we renovated the center. We now have a Dharma library with a rich collection of 800 books in Italian, English, and French on the various Buddhist traditions. We also organized a room with a projector and wide screen so we can watch Dharma events and teachings from other centers.
In 2019, our board of directors decided we had to use the money we receive to give back to our local community. We got in touch with the Padova municipality social services department, who included us in a new project. The municipality has a few apartments for homeless people and people with vulnerabilities. Our task was to go into every apartment and propose cooking classes. In addition to offering seasonal, healthy, vegetarian meal preparation classes, we were also asked to share some useful tools for daily living, including hygiene, tidiness, and a taste for healthy food.
The social services department staff and residents were a little worried about our true intentions—proselytism is always a concern—but the meetings were arranged in the presence of a representative from the social services department.
Donated blast chiller, Santuario di San Leopoldo Mandic (Saint Leopoldo Mandic Sanctuary), Padova, Italy, October 2020. Photo by Teresa Fabbris.
Volunteers brought presents each time they visited the apartments—a few tools to help in the kitchen such as pans or a blender—and enough groceries to prepare the meal twice.
After the second visit, Marco wrote, “This evening we prepared a mushroom soup, chickpea and radish balls, cauliflower humus with olives, and a chocolate cake. Eight people crowded into a tiny kitchen, looking for knives and pans that simply weren’t there. After cooking the meal, we managed to sit down and eat all together. Everyone had something to tell or share. When we left we didn’t know what to say or think. Now back at home I don’t know what to write, but it would be wonderful if every sentient being could have happiness.” We were able to offer five classes before the pandemic made us stop for now.
In 2020, we decided to help a local Catholic monastery of Capuchin monks located next to Santuario di San Leopoldo Mandic. We have been in touch with them for a few years now. They have been preparing meals for homeless people every day since the end of World War II. We help them by collecting food for their kitchen. People who visit our center can leave food items in the shopping cart we keep at the entrance to our center. Every week or so, a volunteer brings the food to the monastery. This project requires minimal effort on our part but is very effective.
In 2020, legislation required the monastery to upgrade their kitchen. We organized a project to help the monks buy some new appliances—an industrial blast chiller, a burner, and three floor washers. The monks haven’t been able to reopen the dining hall due to the COVID pandemic, but they keep distributing shopping bags full of food. We continue to help them collect food.
Donated ambulance outside of Palazzo Moroni, Comune di Padova (city hall) during the press conference, Padova, Italy, December 2020. Photo by Marco Parolin.
In March 2020, the Italian Buddhist Union bestowed funds to support every center during this recession. Since we had enough to cover our expenses, we decided we could do something to help our community to cope with the healthcare emergency.
We chose to help the local Red Cross buy an ambulance. With €20,000 (US$23,860) we were able to buy the vehicle. The Red Cross then arranged to use the vehicle to help people with the coronavirus. The ambulance has a sophisticated intensive care system onboard. This allows the Red Cross to transport patients in critical condition over long distances.
These days you can see the ambulance around the streets in Padova, with the message “Con il contributo del Centro Tara Cittamani” (“With the contribution of Tara Cittamani Center”) painted on the side. We hope that the words “Tara Cittamani” will help protect the people who need the ambulance from fear and despair.
Watch the one and a half minute video “Padova, due preziosi regali di Natale per la Croce Rossa” (“Padua, two precious Christmas gifts for the Red Cross”) published by news agency RAI – Radiotelevisione italiana, the national public broadcasting company of Italy, on December 14, 2020:
https://www.rainews.it/tgr/veneto/video/2020/12/ven-Emergenza-sanitaria-Padova-Ambulanze-nuove-donate-alla-Croce-Rossa-6099f05e-3aa4-46f8-a074-cdb0176c116e.html
We used the remaining €10,000 (US$11,928) to help the local city hospital buy diagnostic kits and screening tests for healthcare workers.
We also use the shopping cart at the entrance to our center to collect food and blankets for animals in need. We periodically bring these donations to local nonprofit animal shelters. We are also preparing to help an animal shelter near Padova with needed renovations. The animal shelter wants to improve their shelters for dogs and cats to better protect them from the cold and extreme heat.
To learn more about Centro Tara Cittamani, visit their website:
https://taracittamani.it/
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Doro Blancke and a friend, supporters of Team Gabitz Helps, preparing food for distribution to the community in Kara Tepe camp, Lesbos, Greece. December 2020. Photo courtesy of Doro Blancke.
Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum, the FPMT center in Vienna, Austria, has raised awareness and support for the thousands of people living in Kara Tepe camp by collecting financial contributions for Gablitz hilft (Gablitz helps.) Kara Tepe is a camp for refugees and asylum seekers—the majority from Syria, Iraq, and Afghanistan— on Lebos, a Greek island in the northern Aegean Sea off the coast of Turkey. Moria, another camp on the island, experienced a devastating fire in September 2020. Gablitz hilft is an all-volunteer organization in Gablitz, Niederösterreich, Austria, that has been accompanying persecuted and refugee people through everyday life since 2015. Community service is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Maragarete (Margit) Sinabell, spiritual program coordinator at Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum, shares the story.
On October 20, 2020, I saw a media report with the headline “Refugees on Lesbos: ‘Even in Moria it was better.'” This report touched me very much. Due to the COVID situation, knowledge of the refugees’ suffering has moved into the background. It is very important to me to stand up for them. Refugees on Lesbos are starving and freezing. They lack winterproof tents, sources of heat, and access to sanitary facilities for daily toilet needs. Without these things, it is hard to keep children safe and warm.
Gablitz hilft has been involved in refugee aid for years. Two Gablitz hilf volunteers, Doro and Helga work with the nonprofit organization Home for All. Founded by Greek locals Nikos and Katherina, Home for All is a social charity kitchen supporting the refugee community. They provide food to 1,200 people every day. On December 4, 2020, Helga journaled, “It keeps raining! From dawn to dusk we are busy supporting Nikos and Katherina with shopping, packing, and delivering the Home-for-All-meals.” They also purchase clothing, firewood, and other necessities such as children’s shoes, sanitary products, and latrines. There are additional 6,800 people in the refugee camp who lack even the most basic necessities.
Kara Tepe camp, Lesbos, Greece, December 2020. Photo courtesy of Doro Blancke.
I personally know a member of the Gablitz hilf board of directors. Karin is a doctor who drives to Greece as often as she can to provide medical care to the refugees. She is a Christian, but as a Buddhist I see her as a great bodhisattva. I’ve worked with Karin several times on different projects. I have been helping and supporting Gablitz hilf for years. However, we can achieve even more if we all join together.
I created a proposal for our center’s board of directors to review at their November 4 meeting, encouraging our center to get involved and financially support Gablitz hilf’s work. Our board of directors decided to appeal to our members and interested parties for donations. (No one from our center is traveling to Lesbos to help.) As a Dharma center, it’s important for us to help others as best as we can. Financial donations are the best way we can help right now. The transport of goods across borders has become difficult due to COVID.
A person cooking a hot meal for the community in Kara Tepe camp, Lesbos, Greece, December 2020. Photo courtesy of Doro Blancke.
Our fundraising campaign led to a pleasant snowball effect and was even picked up and spread by partners in Belgium. The result far exceeded our expectations and touched our hearts deeply. By January 25, we had collected a total of € 8,729 (US$10,514.) Since Gablitz hilf is an all-volunteer organization, all of the donations we sent went to the refugees in Kara Tepe camp on Lesbos for food, care, hygiene items, and a permanent living space. The refugees and everyone involved are very happy.
Alice Grundboeck, the previous center director, shared some thoughts about community service. Alice said, “It allows students to practice Dharma in daily life, and it empowers students. Non-Buddhists can get an impression of what Buddhism means. When we do community service we meet people of different faiths. This can blossom into further cooperation regarding community service. We just began another project, supporting Tierparadies Schabenreith (Schabenreith animal paradise), a sanctuary in Austria that prevents animals from being killed too.”
For more information about Panchen Losang Chogyen Gelugzentrum, visit their website:
https://gelugwien.at/
For more information about Kara Tepe camp, visit the International Refugee Committee (IRC) website. IRC is one of the organizations running services in the camp:
https://www.rescue.org/country/greece
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.
Buddha House fete and open day, Magill, South Australia, Australia, January 2021. Photo by Kaya Migalka.
Buddha House, the FPMT center in Magill, South Australia, Australia, held their first free-entry fete and open day on Saturday, January 30, 2021, from 10 a.m. to 3 p.m. at the center. Hundreds of visitors browsed the outdoor stalls, visited the gift shop, saw the holy objects in the gompa, experienced a meditation or short talk by Gen Thubten Dondrub, and enjoyed Malaysian street food in the student lounge. Funds raised will help the Adelaide-area center keep up with ongoing expenses and maintenance needs. Income generation is one of FPMT’s Five Pillars of Service. Carole Migalka, fete coordinator, shares the story.
Inspired by the stories in Big Love: The Life and Teachings of Lama Yeshe of festivals held at Manjushri Institute and Sandhurst Town and Lama Yeshe’s encouragement to bring people together in an informal setting, our center decided to revive the pioneer student’s spirit with a community fete and open day.
Buddha House office volunteer Shez Malone running a craft stall at the Buddha House fete and open day, Magill, South Australia, Australia, January 2021. Photo by Kaya Migalka.
The idea was simple: welcome neighbors, friends, and community members with food, drinks, and market stalls; show them around the center; and let them sample the Buddha House program. “Come and try meditation” sessions were offered, as well as a short Dharma talk, “What does it mean to be a Buddhist?” with FPMT resident teacher Gen Thubten Dondrub*—himself one of the early Western sangha.
When the Facebook event was shared and tagged widely, the committee knew we had generated some interest, but we could not have anticipated the wonderful support received. Well over 500 people visited on a perfect mild, summer day.
Buddha House Dharma Kids Club (DKC) coordinator Sascha Holyoak with DKC member David at a face painting stall at the Buddha House fete and open day, Magill, South Australia, Australia, January 2021. Photo by Kaya Migalka.
Delicious homemade food was offered by the Malaysian community; volunteers baked cakes, potted plants, and donated goods; and then all pitched in on the day of the fete to work on the stalls. The atmosphere was one of joyous effort offered by over thirty volunteers.
The community responded with joy, sharing with us, “I had always wanted to visit, but wasn’t sure when to come;” “I had driven past many times but didn’t know what it was;” and “We had no idea there was such a diverse program.”
The primary motivation for the day was to bring people to the Dharma, but it also resulted in a successful fundraiser with much-appreciated income going toward maintenance of the beautiful heritage chapel that is home to the Buddha House gompa.
With such a wonderful time had by all, this could become an annual tradition. Who knows we might even bring back Lama Yeshe’s favorite, the gumboot throwing event.
Malaysian food stall volunteer Eunice serving food donated by the Malaysian community at the Buddha House fete and open day, Magill, South Australia, Australia, January 2021. Photo by Kaya Migalka.
* In 2019 Gen Thubten Dondrub requested Buddha House students formally refer to him as “Gen Thubten Dondrub.” He shared, “Usually monks and nuns of the FPMT are referred to as ‘Venerable.’ I have always found this term uncomfortable as it is a very exalted term and is used in the Catholic Church to refer to someone who is in line to be canonized as a saint. When I was in Taiwan I learned that every monk and nun was addressed as ‘Fa Shr’ from the moment they were ordained. The term means ‘Dharma teacher.’ The closest Tibetan equivalent is ‘ge.gen,’ often abbreviated to ‘Gen’ or ‘Gen-la.’ It is polite and friendly. So when people ask how to address me, I suggest using that term. It seems much more appropriate than ‘Venerable.'”
For more information about Buddha House, visit their website:
http://buddhahouse.org
FPMT.org and Mandala Publications brings you news of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and of activities, teachings, and events from over 160 FPMT centers, projects, and services around the globe. If you like what you read, consider becoming a Friend of FPMT, which supports our work.