Thanks for visiting our blog
My name is Chophel and I am one of the Monks from the Gaden Shartse Tour.
The Tour has been visiting the United States since 1989 to fulfill their mission of helping to spread peace, compassion, and tolerance through cultural exchange, interfaith dialog, and Buddhist teachings. Along the way we are meeting thousands of wonderful friends and thought that it would be a good idea to create a blog to keep in touch as we move about the country.
This is meant to be an interactive site, so please feel free to contribute. We hope that this will help us to build a community based upon compassion, tolerance, and healing.
August 15, 2010 – 7:03 pm
Many faiths find harmony as Buddhist monks visit Toledo, share blessings
Service at Methodist church emphasizes tolerance, peace
U.S.-born Venerable Jangchub Chophel, center, speaks with Ben Travis in Maumee as another Buddhist monk looks on. ( THE BLADE/JEREMY WADSWORTH )
Wearing saffron-and-maroon-colored robes with crested shamo hats, seven Tibetan Buddhist monks stood in a line before a Christian altar and harmonized a complex, ancient chant during a multifaith gathering in Toledo Thursday night. The monks’ multitoned throat chants, ranging from rumbling bass notes to soaring high-pitched tones, were accompanied by a symbolic “bathing ritual,” in which water that had been transformed into “radiant, blissful nectar” was poured into a bowl from a peacock feather-topped pot. “We called forth the bodhisattvas [enlightened ones] and asked them for a blessing for all the people here and the prayers that were offered tonight,” said Venerable Jangchub Chophel, the lone American-born monk in the touring group from a Tibetan Buddhist monastery in India. The inclusive prayer-chants were a fitting send-off for the 150 or so people who were treated to prayers, readings, music, dance, stories, information, and even a puppet show from seven religious groups – Baha’is, Unitarian Universalists, Christians, Hindus, Muslims, Sufis, and Buddhists. The service at Monroe Street United Methodist Church was titled “World Peace and the Unity of All Religions: A Multi-Faith Gathering.” “It doesn’t mean everybody believes the same thing, but we can all sit down and talk,” said Paula Massey, a local Buddhist who helped arrange the six-day visit by monks from the Gaden Shartse Monastery in southern India. Read More »
Four Tibetan monks from the Gaden Shartse Monastery in India assisted in the ceremony held this week at the Buddhist meditation center on Portage Trail.
