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Members of Choe Khor Sum Ling Study Group and Ven. Tenzin Namdak meet with Geshe Tashi Tsering, abbot of Gyume Tantric Monastic University, India, July 2012
Choe Khor Sum Ling (CKSL), the FPMT study group in Bangalore, India, recently wrote Mandala about some of the highlights of their summer program.
“We had a beautiful and especially blessed Saka Dawa,” CKSL writes. “During the lunch break we got an unexpected phone call: H.E. Ling Choktrul Rinpoche was in Bangalore and wanted to come to one of the local temples or centers to do prayers and offerings. We were very humbled that His Excellency chose to come to CKSL for Saka Dawa.” With three hours’ notice, a Shakyamuni puja to do, members to alert, a center to prepare, and offerings and khatas to gather, students did not waste any time getting things done and were ready to welcome Ling Rinpoche when he arrived.
H.E. Ling Rinpoche at Choe Kor Sum Ling, India, June 2012
“Rinpoche told us that he was very happy to be with us,” the CKSL shared. After tea, Ling Rinpoche led the group in various prayers and “expressed his happiness at the good work CKSL is doing and blessed us. He spoke very fondly of Lama Zopa Rinpoche and told us he had spent time with Rinpoche at Tushita in May.”
After Rinpoche left, Ven. Tenzin Namjong, from Sera IMI House, gave a talk on buddha-nature according to the different Buddhist tenet systems. Ven. Namjong had also brought with him precious relics of Shakyamuni Buddha, Jetsün Milarepa and Lama Yeshe and blessed the students in attendance with them. “It was a very auspicious day for us with H.E. Ling Rinpoche gracing us with his divine presence and our teacher Ven. Namjong taking great care to make the day as meritorious as possible for all present,” CKSL wrote.
On July 21, members of CKSL arrived at the School of Snowland Tibetan Studies at Gyume Tantric Monastic University for a three-day retreat. Ven. Tenzin Namdak – a regular teacher and interpreter at CKSL, director of Sera IMI House and in his fifteenth year of the geshe study program of Sera Je Monastery – led the retreat.
On the retreat’s first evening, students met with the abbot of Gyume, Geshe Tashi Tsering, who had been the resident teacher at Chenrezig Institute in Australia 1990-2008. “The Abbot was most pleased that we Indians had come to Gyume and were on a retreat. He was very amiable and very endearing, and he gave us general advice on a few topics,” CKSL wrote. “The next day Geshe-la spoke to us briefly about emptiness in the Buddhist context.”
July 23 was Chokhor Duchen, the day commemorating the first turning of the wheel of Dharma, and CKSL students were able to make money offerings to the Gyume monks in the main temple.
Making offerings to monks at Gyume, India, July 2012
With 158 centers, projects and services around the globe, there is always news on FPMT activities, teachers and events. Mandala hopes to share as many of these timely stories as possible. If you have news you would like to share, please let us know.