Shrine Room Project

Registration open for the Winter Retreat in Berlin

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The second Bodhicharya Winter Retreat will take place at Bodhicharya Berlin from December 3rd 6pm to December 6th 5pm.

This retreat is once again organised as a fundraiser for the building of Bodhicharya Berlin.

Ringu Tulku will teach from the text ‘108 Instructions of Jonang’, a collection of pith instructions from all the lineages that came from India to Tibet. This collection was compiled by Kunga Drolchok (1507-1566) and Jetsun Taranatha (1575-1634).

For more information and to register, visit the Winter Retreat page.

HH Karmapa’s visit to Bodhicharya Berlin

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Visit & Teaching at Bodhicharya Berlin

Berlin, Germany – 6th September, 2015.

More than 350 people comprising representatives of Bodhicharya centres across Europe, members and supporters of the Berlin centre, and invited guests crowded into the main shrine room to greet the 17th Karmapa on this his final teaching engagement during his second visit to Europe. A distant sound of Tibetan gyalin announced his arrival at the centre. His Holiness was greeted at the gates to the centre by its founder Ringu Tulku Rinpoche, who escorted him along the brick path through the buildings, preceded by a boy and a girl scattering flower petals. After planting a tree in the garden, His Holiness made his way to the shrine room.

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HH Karmapa to visit Bodhicharya Berlin

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HH Karmapa will once again visit Bodhicharya Berlin this coming Sunday (6th September 2015). His Holiness will give a brief teaching for this special occasion entitled “Heart Advice”.

Although the event itself is not open to the public (as space is limited) it will be webcast live on the Kagyu Office webcast page here: http://kagyuoffice.org/webcast/

The event begins at 10:00am (CET)

His Holiness the 17th Karmapa Visits Bodhicharya Berlin.

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Click on the image above to see more images.

On the sunny morning of June 6, 2014 , the Karmapa and his entourage drove down Kinzigstrasse in the former East Berlin to pay a visit to the Bodhicarya center, founded by Ringu Tulku Rinpoche.  The wood fence lining the street outside the center is decorated with colorful drawings of the eight auspicious symbols, which lead up to the main gate. Its doors are opened wide to reveal a vista of the countryside hidden in this corner of Berlin. Winding paths lined with grasses and flowers wend their way past red brick, single-story buildings to the tall meditation hall at the back of the property. On top are special rooms for the Karmapa including a balcony with a view of the gardens and the surrounding area. Continue reading

The ‘Viktualienmarket-Buddha’ comes from Munic to Berlin

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Bodhicharya Berlin has adopted a 3.49 m high Buddha statue, the meanwhile quite famous “Viktualienmarket-Buddha”. This art installation by the Malayan artist Han Chong “Made in Dresden” is part of a series of art projects in Munic. The London based artist, himself a Buddhist, has created a Buddha statue in the lotus position, deliberately laid on the back. He wants to raise questions about using religious symbols as souvenirs or decoration, far away from their spiritual context.

Bodhicharya Berlin has applied for the Buddha, after the end of the exhibition. The artist is very happy that his artwork will find a place in the Bodhicharya Berlin temple, that way being transformed back into a religious symbol useful for the Buddhist community. He and the organisers agreed to give the Buddha as a donation and even repair the back.

Some Buddhists protested against the artwork and demanded it to be removed. Other Buddhists supported the worthwhile aim and the context of the exhibition. Bodhicharya Berlin is happy to give the Buddha, then in an upright position, a permanent home, that way contributing to a peaceful and harmonious end of the art installation.

The form of the Buddha is modelled after the bronze statue Kamakura Daibutsu in Japan, which is 12 m high and was erected in the 13th century. Every year more than one million people from all over the world make a pilgrimage to Kamakura to see this bronze statue.

Here are some more pictures of the statue.

Back in Berlin

After his US tour, Rinpoche is back in Europe and returned to Berlin on Monday May 6th, 2013. He taught at Rigpa for one night and then spent three days in Bodhicharya.

At his “home” in Berlin, Rinpoche gave teachings on Karma in a fully packed gompa.

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He had lunch with the sangha.

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Meetings were also held to prepare the annual general assembly that took place on May 8th, to organise fundraising and to plan the next winter retreat to be held in Bodhicharya Berlin in February 2014.

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After Berlin, Rinpoche will travel to Hamburg, Vienna and Huttenried before flying back to India. The Summer leg of his European tour will start in Southampton on June 15th 2013. See Rinpoche’s travel schedule for more details.

Seats for the Winter Retreat in Berlin still available

About 20 seats are still available for the very first Bodhicharya Winter Retreat in Berlin with Ringu Tulku from January 3rd to 7th 2013.

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This intensive retreat, that we hope to make an annual event, is organised as a fundraiser for the building of the new temple in Bodhicharya Berlin.

You can find further information about the retreat and the registration procedure here.

 

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Please join us if you can!