In the idyllic town of Valle de Bravo, Mexico, is a stupa under the care of Casa Tíbet México, the remarkable La Gran Stupa Bon para la Paz Mundia. This beautiful religious landmark on the outskirts of Mexico City was founded by Bön teacher Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche and consecrated in 2010. Despite the relatively marginal presence of […]
Raymond Lam
The Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia: A Cause Worth Supporting
For years, the Swedish-born monk Vello Väärtnou has toiled on two core projects: the opening of a Buddhist Studies institute in Sweden and an online Tibetan Buddhist Encyclopedia. It brings together Tibetan, Chinese, Sanskrit, and Pali terms in a collection of approximately 81,700 entries explaining the terminology and discourse of Vajrayana Buddhism. I have known him […]
Earth Day 2022: Only So Many Chances
Today is Earth Day, a perfect opportunity to rethink our conventional paradigms that are dooming the planet’s livability for human beings. Today I would like to explore briefly several ideas alluded to in yesterday’s post. The first is Dr. María Elvira Ríos’ exploration of ganying, Dependent Origination in Óscar Carrera’s writing, and Jordi Solé Ollé’s exploration […]
Earth Day 2022: Assemble all Beings
22 April is Earth Day, and the occasion comes with renewed urgency as we now know that it is highly unlikely that we can stop the world from passing 1.5 degrees Celsius of warming in the next ten years. There is still hope that the world can keep the world from warming to 2.0 degrees […]
Changing Minds: Uniting Monasticism with Education
What happens when monastics leave their school and disrobe for lay life? Maintaining the bridge between the old and new life with Choje Lama Wangchuk
Back to School: Integrating Refugee Children in New Communities
When children are forced to leave their home because of the ravages of war, they do not just need a physically safe environment, where they can grow up in peace. They need psychological support, oft-times trauma recovery, and validation and recognition of the struggles they have gone through. Such validation can be integrated into a […]
Christian Zen: Unlikely and Unorthodox, or Universal?
I recently received unfortunate news. A Buddhist-Christian interfaith event organized by the International Centre for Teresian-Sanjuanist Studies (CITeS), The University of Mysticism in Ávila, has been cancelled. The event was supposed to take place in July 2020, before the pandemic forced the conference to be held on July 2021. After the recent surge in cases […]
Women-led Buddha-dharma, from Brazil to Breda
Despite having been excluded from the upper echelons of religious leadership in many traditions, women play a core part in religious communities. Women tend to attend religious rituals more regularly than men, and bring their male relations and spouses to these events. In more traditional societies, women facilitate community cohesion and assist the integration of […]
Soka Gakkai in Latin America: New Frontiers for Women
The worldwide organization of Soka Gakkai is classed as a “new religious movement,” which is characterized by lay leaders and pastors, a vibrant and proactive missionary philosophy, and a core message that is easily replicable and attractive. In Soka Gakkai’s hermeneutic, the Lotus Sutra is the core scripture that contains the essence of the Buddha’s […]
Love amidst Dislocation: Metta on the Move
There were children fleeing broken countries with their families long before the current Ukraine crisis. The estimated total of displaced children on the move globally is 50 million: a staggering number, each statistic a fearful child taking extreme risks for the chance of a better life. (American Psychological Association) The ancient Metta Sutta is famous […]