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FPMT Community: Stories & News
Students of Gyaltsab Je Study Group. Photo courtesy of Gyaltsab Je Study Group.
Gyaltsab Je Study Group in Ile de la Réunion, situated east of Madagascar, shares some news with Mandala from their island home:
On July 6, 2013, a good number of students responded to our invitation to share a moment in honor of His Holiness the Dalai Lama’s birthday.
After a presentation of His Holiness’ bibliography by Marc, we took turns reading pieces of the Dalai Lama’s advice. We noted that each of selections matched our personalities because Daniel had placed them before our arrival. This made for a fully emotional moment: recalling the extraordinary life of the 14th Dalai Lama, his exile, that of his people, his political and spiritual missions, his choices that demonstrate his generosity, his compassion.
Ven. Thubten Sangpo next guided us on a meditation on the six realms of samsara, followed by a long-life prayer for His Holiness the Dalai Lama and a prayer for Lama Zopa Rinpoche.
We finished the afternoon as a small group of friends in good spirits. We thank all those who joined this meeting and thank the town hall of Saint-Pierre which lent us a room for the occasion.
Gyaltsab Je Study Group’s blog is available in French.
Mandala brings you news and updates from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you have a story to share, please let us know.
From left: Dagri Rinpoche, Yangsi Rinpoche and Lama Zopa Rinpoche listening to Geshe Ngawang Dakpa, Land of Medicine Buddha, California, US, September 29, 2013. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche was joined by Dagri Rinpoche, Yangsi Rinpoche and Geshe Ngawang Dakpa for the lunch offered after the long life puja for Lama Zopa Rinpoche at Land of Medicine Buddha in California, US, on Sunday, September 29, 2013.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche continues his stay in California. Dagri Rinpoche was teaching a course at Land of Medicine Buddha. Yangsi Rinpoche, president of Maitripa College in Portland, Oregon, flew to California to attend the puja. Geshe Dakpa is the resident teacher at Tse Chen Ling in nearby San Francisco.
Medicine Buddha by Peter Iseli
“Warm greetings from here in Pure Land of Medicine Buddha,” project coordinator Maria Domsholt wrote to Mandala. Pure Land of Medicine Buddha is the hospice project of Tong-nyi Nying-je Ling, the FPMT center in Denmark. In September, the project began organizing 19 volunteers to cover both night and day shifts for dying people in their last days of life. Volunteers also visit with chronically sick and terminally ill people. Medicine Buddha puja and prayers are part of the volunteers practice as well.
“When one of our patients die, a volunteer paints the name of the patient on a small stupa that had been filled and blessed from Kopan Monastery. We give that to the family of the patient,” Maria wrote.
Volunteers also continue training to use the Liberation Box, a collection of Dharma tools for the time of death assembled according to Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s advice. Materials on how to use the Liberation Box have been translated into Danish and edited by Dharma Wisdom Publishing, another project of Tong-nyi Nying-je Ling.
Mandala 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 have news you would like to share, please let us know.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche visiting H.E. Choden Rinpoche, San Jose, California, September 30, 2013. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
During late September, both Lama Zopa Rinpoche and His Eminence Choden Rinpoche were in the Bay Area of California. Lama Zopa Rinpoche visited with His Eminence on September 30 in San Jose.
Mandala 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 have news you would like to share, please let us know.
On September 29, 2013, Tenzin Ösel Hita read the following words of praise to Lama Zopa Rinpche during a long life puja offered to Rinpoche at Land of Medicine Buddha, Soquel, California, USA.
Video of Tenzin Ösel Hita Offering Praise to Lama Zopa Rinpoche
Tenzin Ösel Hita’s Praise to Lama Zopa Rinpoche
Dearest spiritual friend and guide, Kyabje Zopa Rinpoche, you are so precious to us in so many different aspects. From so many angles in life, do you benefit us constantly with no break, no rest, no sleep.
Dear Lama Zopa-la, we are so grateful for your presence in this planet. We are so lucky to be able to share this space and time with you.
Since the beginning, you have dedicated your life fully to improving peoples’ spiritual lives, even though I’m sure you would love to spend many years in a Lawudo cave deep in meditation. Thank you so much for choosing to stay with us and guide us towards our inner potential.
We know how each and every action you do is dedicated to helping sentient beings – every thought, every breath; every sip of water you take is dedicated to sentient beings. We are so lucky to have you in our midst. You inspire us to be better people, and your presence gives us motivation to follow your example. You are constantly helping so many sentient beings from so many different dimensions. It is amazing to see your work in this world.
Please stay with us for as long as it takes all sentient beings to reach enlightenment. We are willing to follow your advice and work hard to accomplish your dreams, which, of course, are always focused on benefiting in the greatest way, in this life and the next.
We all thank you so much from the depth of our hearts; we wish you success in all of your vast visions present and future.
Lama Zopa-la please live a long life. And rest a bit when you can.
Thank you for guiding us relentlessly – without rest, without tiring.
Thank you for helping us purify, for sparking interest into investigating our own egos and ignorance.
Thank you for making us see how mistaken we are.
Please continue helping sentient beings, and live a long life, with no obstacles.
Thank you, Rinpoche, for your kindness and dedication.
We love you Lama Zopa-la.
Thank you so much.
Students meditating at a Vajrapani retreat
“How do you reconcile the tension between making the Dharma truly accessible to all and covering the high operating costs of retreats? That tension brings up a scarcity mindset. From there it’s unlikely that everyone’s needs will be met. So what would happen if we trusted in the spirit of generosity instead?” asked Fabienne Pradelle, director of Vajrapani Institute in California.
Stupa at Vajrapani
With the upcoming retreat “Kopan West: Buddhism 101, A Course on the Gradual Path to Enlightenment with Andy Wistreich,” Vajrapani decided to experiment with connecting generosity to helping students deepen their lam-rim practice. Kopan West starts on November 22 and is being sponsored by past retreatants and benefactors and is offered to anyone who participates.
Lam-rim, or stages of the path, study and meditation is central to the experience of FPMT students, both beginners and long-time practioners. The recent advice from FPMT spiritual director Lama Zopa Rinpoche emphasizes gaining actual realizations of lam-rim through meditation and retreat. Like the November courses offered at Kopan Monastery in Nepal, Kopan West students receive instruction in lam-rim teachings. Andy Wistreich, who’s leading this year’s retreat, is a senior student of Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche and has led many retreats with students of all levels around the world.
“With Kopan West, someone else has paid for you to be on retreat, someone you don’t even know. How inspiring is that!” Fabienne told Mandala. “Would you want to donate forward to the next person? That’s completely up to you. Will this mindset of generosity be sustainable? How long will the chain last? We don’t know. But we believe in the power of generosity that exists in each and everyone of us.”
Fabienne and the team at Vajrapani have been inspired to try this experiment in generosity in part by Nipun Metha, who’s become an well known advocate in California’s Bay Area for radical generosity. Fabienne recommended a video of Nipun Metha, describing some of the work he’s been involved with, to further explain the thinking behind offering Kopan West as a “pay it forward” retreat.
“Truly amazing things can happen when we let go of the scarcity mindset and look at the world with a spirit of generosity,” Fabienne said.
Visit Vajrapani Institute’s website for more on the course and retreats they offer.
Mandala 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 have news you would like to share, please let us know.
Rinpoche pointing out to Dagri Rinpoche where Lama Yeshe lived. Rinpoche’s house is “by chance” only a few miles away. “It wasn’t planned, it just happened like that!” Aptos, California, September 28, 2013. Photo by Ven. Roger Kunsang.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche has been in the United States for the last three weeks, staying at Kachoe Dechen Ling, his home in Aptos on California’s central coast. On September 28, Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Dagri Rinpoche, who was in California offering teachings at Land of Medicine Buddha, went out on a local pier to bless all the sentient beings in the ocean.
While in California, Lama Zopa Rinpoche regularly goes to the ocean with specially made Namgyälma mantra boards that are lowered into the water to bless all the beings. You can read more about the Namgyälma mantra and blessing the animals in the ocean on Mandala.
Lama Zopa Rinpoche holding ropes attached to mantra boards blessing beings in the ocean, Aptos, California, September 14, 2013. Photo by Ven. Thubten Kunsang.
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New prayer wheels from Nepal installed at the Garden of Enlightenment, Chenrezig Institute, Queensland, Australia, 2013. Photo by Ray Furminger.
At the Garden of Enlightenment, a project of Chenrezig Institute in Queensland, all of the spaces for prayer wheels along the front wall of the main shrine building are now taken. The main building of the stupa garden serves as the base for eight great stupas, the largest of which is 10 meters (33 feet) tall. The shrine and stupas are surrounded by ornamental gardens. The prayer wheels along the front wall are colored wheels and were made at the Chenrezig art studio. They are very difficult to construct and expensive to produce. So on a recent trip to Kopan Monastery in Nepal, we looked at copper and brass wheels and decided to use the Nepali wheels for the remaining walls. They are far more practical, will last longer and, because of their slightly smaller size, we can fit many more prayer wheels along the walls. We received the first shipment of ten in April and already six have been sponsored.
Stupa and wall of tsa-tsa tiles in shrine at Garden of Enlightenment, Queensland. Photo by Ray Furminger.
One very positive thing that has happened over the past three or four years is we are getting regular visits from schools to Chenrezig Institute and the Garden of Enlightenment. Often the students are coming from Christian colleges, when they are doing assignments on different religions. When they visit the gardens, we usually split into a few groups and senior students talk them through the project and encourage general questions. The result always seems to be positive as most of the questions are well thought through, often brilliant and sometimes hilarious.
We continue to offer half of the money donated for tsa-tsa tiles on the internal walls of the shrine building to the Maitreya Project. Small memorial stupas are also located inside the building as well as being placed throughout the gardens.
Mandala brings you news and updates from over 160 FPMT centers, projects and services around the globe. If you have a story to share, please let us know.
Geshe Lobsang Sherab at Kopan Monastery, December 2009
Geshe Lobsang Sherab was born in 1965 to a local family in Manang, a mountainous area in Nepal near Annapurna. He went to Kopan Monastery in Kathmandu in 1974 and was ordained there. Geshe Sherab studied at Sera Monastic University in South India, where he completed his Geshe degree. He was a resident geshe at Kopan Monastery and was one of the main philosophy teachers there. Geshe Sherab also served FPMT as a resident geshe at Losang Dragpa Centre in Malaysia and Shakyamuni Center in Taiwan.
Geshe-la died suddenly on the afternoon of Wednesday, September 25 at Kopan. After his death, prayers and pujas were done by groups of monks day and night until the cremation. Lama Chöpa was performed and the eight auspicious prayers were recited in the evenings by the whole monastic community. The tantric monks performed Yamantaka sadhana and self-initiation. The Khachoe Ghakyil (Kopan) nuns performed Vajrayogini self-initiation.
The cremation took place on Friday, September 27, following the advice of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi, the current abbot of Kopan. During the cremation, Yamantaka sadhana and fire puja were performed. All the senior monks and nuns as well as a great number of laypeople attended the cremation.
Mandala will print a complete obituary for Geshe Lobsang Sherab in the January-March 2014 issue.
Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi receiving offering from Geshe Sherab at long life puja, Amitabha Buddhist Centre, Singapore, July 2013. All photos by Tan Seow Kheng; courtesy of ABC.
In July 2013, Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi accepted his first long life puja in the presence of some 200 students and well-wishers at Amitabha Buddhist Centre (ABC) in Singapore. Khen Rinpoche, who is ABC’s resident teacher as well as the abbot of Kopan Monastery and Nunnery, said he enjoyed receiving the puja, which was organized to celebrate his 51st birthday.
For 10 years, Khen Rinpoche joked, he was used to being the one making the offerings during the long life ceremonies for Lama Zopa Rinpoche and Khensur Rinpoche Lama Lhundrup. This time, the ritual master was Geshe Thubten Sherab, who had accepted the invitation to travel from Kopan Monastery for the occasion. The puja itself was led by the chanting master of Kopan Monastery, Geshe Lobsang Sherab. The resident teachers and directors of the three FPMT centers in Malaysia also made a special trip to Singapore to be part of the celebration.
Khen Rinpoche spoke before the puja on how to make the practice meaningful:
We all know what Lama Zopa Rinpoche has mentioned before about the long life puja. Mainly when we offer long life puja to the gurus, we have a Dharma connection with them. From your heart, when you make strong requests for the gurus to live long, that helps the guru to live long. The whole point why you are requesting is because you see some benefit for the guru to live long. If you can see from your heart why the guru needs to live long, then make single-pointed request to the gurus. When you request the guru to live long, at the same time you yourself have long life. That is the benefit. Both of you [guru and disciple] get the benefit.
When you do the long life puja, it is mainly the practice of Guru Puja. Remember to visualize or think that your own guru is in front of you. It doesn’t have to be me. Those who have a close Dharma connection with your own gurus, you can visualize them. Then you make these extensive offerings to the guru from your heart, and make strong requests for the guru to live long.
Make sure, as you are doing the Guru Puja, to make it meaningful for yourself. When you do it well, that means you are closer to the gurus. That means you are closer to enlightenment, closer to the Buddha, closer to the Dharma, closer to the Sangha. Make sure you do that. I think it is extremely important.
ABC vice-president Fred Cheong and director Tan Hup Cheng presenting Dharma wheel, Singapore, July 2013
Among the procession of offerings presented to Khen Rinpoche was an impressively large Dharma wheel, a gift from the center and the second batch of Basic Program students whom Khen Rinpoche has taught for the past two years. Representing the center and the students, ABC’s director Tan Hup Cheng and vice-president Fred Cheong presented the gigantic wheel to Khen Rinpoche together with a strong request that he would continue to teach at ABC for a very long time.
Besides the Basic Program, Khen Rinpoche teaches a weekly lam-rim class that is translated for Chinese speakers, and a monthly “Dharma for Seniors” class. Khen Rinpoche has also formed a bond with some of the youngest members of ABC, including ten-year-old Melody Wee, who offered a song. Her mature and captivating rendition of “If We Hold on Together” held all the grown-ups in misty-eyed rapture.
Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi with Melody Wee, ABC, July 2013
At the end of the puja, Khen Rinpoche offered an insight into his life and why he has continued to stay as ABC’s resident teacher:
I was born in 1962. I spent 12 years with my family. After that I spent six years in Kopan Monastery, then I spent another 18 to 19 years in South India, then I spent 14 years in Singapore.
When I look back at myself, how I became a monk is because I met Lama Yeshe, the first time when I was aged 12, in 1974. Lama Yeshe came all the way to my hometown and I met him there. Because of that I was able to become a monk, to be ordained. After I became ordained I spent six years at Kopan. I was able to stay as a monk because of the late ex-abbot Lama Lhundrup. When I was 15 to 17 years old, my mind was always wandering. It was not an easy time, under different conditions. Because of his advice, I was able to remain as a monk at that time. After that I moved to South India. I had all this education [at Sera Je Monastery]. All this depended one hundred per cent on my teacher [Khensur Rinpoche Lobsang Tsering, ex-abbot of Sera Je Monastery]. Because of his kindness, I was able to complete my studies at the level of geshe. After that, I came to Singapore.
Being able to live here for 14 years is all from depending on Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s advice. I mentioned before, when I came for the first time to Singapore, I thought I would stay just one year. I told my friends, everybody, I would try for one year. After one year I will be back, I said! Somehow I have stayed until now, because of Rinpoche’s advice.
Why I have stayed here so long is because of the members and students of Amitabha Buddhist Centre, because they all have some interest to learn Buddhadharma. That is the main thing that has made me stay here, so far, because I see that people have interest, put in effort. Some of them really, for 14 years they are here with me, without missing class, twice a week. When I see their lives, how busy they are. They have to work from morning to night. Also, they have families, have to go out with the family, need time for the family, but still they put in so much effort and come to class. So really, that really makes me stay in Singapore, here, to teach. That is the main reason. How long I stay here all depends on that. Entirely depends on that.
Khen Rinpoche Geshe Chonyi during long life puja, ABC, July 2013
In keeping with the occasion of celebrating Khen Rinpoche’s birthday, there was a festive mood to the puja. And true to Singapore’s culture, the celebration was made complete with hearty eating, a Thai-style lunch buffet treat for everyone from ABC’s Executive Committee, who requested Khen Rinpoche to accept the long life puja and who also organized it.
Mandala 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 have news you would like to share, please let us know.
Ösel (right) with his teacher Geshe Gendun Chompel (middle), and his partner, Mai (left).
The Lama Zopa Rinpoche Bodhichitta Fund recently offered US$14,463 for the roof repair of Tenzin Ösel Hita’s teacher, Geshe Gendun Chompel. Ösel requested that Lama Zopa Rinpoche help in this way because the roof was very old and extremely hot in the Summer, making it very difficult for anyone to remain inside.
Ösel is still taking teachings from Geshe Gendun Chompel, and said this about those teachings in 2013, “It is so wonderful to hear the Dharma in such simple and clear terms, while clearing so many doubts I’ve had during a long time of my life. Understanding the teachings without having to clarify with anybody but myself. I’m so grateful for the understanding and help I have received. Thank you for the time to find myself, thank you for the patience and dedication, dearest Gen-la. You are like my Father and Mother, and will always be in my heart.”
Wisdom Publications staff, Somerville, Massachusetts, US. Photo courtesy of WisdomPubs.org.
It’s a big week for Wisdom Publications, a leading publisher of Buddhist books and an affiliate of FPMT. The Somerville, Massachusetts-based publisher announced a new website with a new blog as well as a new distribution arrangement with the international publisher Simon and Schuster.
“We look forward to working with Simon and Schuster to better fulfill our mission of nurturing communities of readers and authors by being a source of high quality, polished and carefully chosen works,” said Tim McNeill, Wisdom Publications CEO.
While Wisdom publishes books from all major Buddhist traditions, the publisher’s catalog of Tibetan Buddhist titles is unparalleled and includes the exceptional Library of Tibetan Classics series as well as titles by many 20th-century Tibetan Buddhist masters.
Wisdom origins stretch back to Lama Yeshe and Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s early days of teaching Dharma to Westerns at Kopan Monastery in Nepal. Ven. Robina Courtina and Lama Yeshe Wisdom Archive director Nick Ribush were involved in the early development of Wisdom Publications. Tim McNeill, a long-time FPMT student and current member of the FPMT Inc. Board of Directors, has led Wisdom and its impressive staff for the past 25 years.
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