By Susan Skorupa
Seven monks from the Tashi Lhunpo monastery in India will visit Reno next week, hoping to raise funds for their monastery in exile.
The three days of events are free and open to the public, but donations are accepted.
On Wednesday, the monks will lecture about the 11th Panchen Lama, the monastery’s 13-year-old spiritual leader, imprisoned with his family in China since 1995. His whereabouts are unknown despite campaigns on his behalf to the Chinese government. The lecture is at 7 p.m. in the Jot Travis Student Union auditorium at the University of Nevada, Reno.
On Thursday, the monks will hold a Mahayana Buddhist teaching from the Gelugpa school of Tibetan Buddhism. The teaching begins at 7 p.m. at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship of Northern Nevada, 780 Del Monte Lane.
On Friday, the monks will participate in Martin Luther King Jr. Multicultural Day at 10 a.m. at Sierra Nevada College, 999 Tahoe Blvd., Incline Village. They’ll also hold a Cham monastic dance performance at 7 p.m. at Jot Travis Student Union. These dances are considered sacred texts as visions of deities in movement.
On all three days, the monks will create a sand mandala at the Nevada Museum of Art Underground at Pioneer Center for the Performing Arts, 100 S. Virginia St. Mandalas, in part, represent maps used for healing the environment and living beings.
On Wednesday and Thursday, the monks will work on the mandala from 9 a.m. to noon and 2 to 5 p.m.
They’ll work from 9 a.m. to noon and 2 to 3 p.m. on Friday, then dismantle the mandala into the Truckee River at 3 p.m. Placing the sand into the water symbolizes the dedication of the mandala energies to universal goodness.
The monks also plan a visit to Galena High School and Wittenberg Hall.
The Tibetan Tashi Lhunpo monastery was founded by the first Dalai Lama in 1447. After their exile from Tibet in 1959, the monks built a monastery in southern India. They are raising funds to replace their prayer hall, build a paved road and help feed more than 250 fellow monks.
For more information on the monastery and the Dalai Lama, visit the Web site www.tashilhunpo.org.
