Lama Gangchen - Italy

INTRODUCTION

OBJECTIVES

THE VERBANIA DECLARATION

SPEAKERS

SPONSORS & PATRONS

Lama Gangchen Rinpoche was born in western Tibet in 1941.
He was recognised at an early age to be a reincarnate Lama healer and was enthroned at Gangchen Choepeling Monastery at the age of five.
When he reached the age of twelve he received the "Kachen" degree which is usually conferred after twenty years of study. Between the ages of thirteen and eighteen, he studied medicine, astrology, meditation and philosophy in two of the major monastic universities of Tibet: Sera and Tashi Lhumpo.

He also studied in Gangchen Gompa, Tropu Gompa and Neytsong Monastery. He was disceple of some of the most important Gelugpa Lamas like H.H. Trjichang Rinpoche. In 1963, he went into exile to India where he continued his studies for the next seven years at the Varanasi Sanskrit University in Benares. In 1970, he received the Geshe Rigram degree (similar to a Ph. D.) from Sera Monastic University situated in South India.

After his graduation, he worked as a Lama healer among the Tibetan communities in Nepal, India and Sikkim, during which time he saved the lives of many people and was named private physician to the Royal Family. In 1981, Lama Gangchen visited Europe for the first time and has since become a resident and Italian citizen. In the same year, he also established his first European center: Karuna Choetsok in Lesbos, Greece, where he planted a bodhi tree in the 'Buddha Garden', and where he consecrated what was to become the first in a long line of World Peace Buddha Statues, thankas and images.

Since 1982, he has travelled extensively, both healing and teaching worldwide, leading many pilgrimages to some of the most important holy places of different religious and spiritual denominations in the world. Since many years Lama Gangchen promotes a very important project: the integration between Tibetan Medicine (an incredible and unlikely still unknown treasure of humankind) with allopathic medicine.

Lama Gangchen Rinpoche is the holder of an ancient and unbroken lineage of Tantric Masters dating from the time of Shakyamuni Buddha. His Ngalso Tantric Selfhealing is based on Buddha's teaching but it's suitable for modern people.

At present he has more than 100 Inner Peace Education centres or Self-Healing Study Groups worldwide.

www.lgpt.net

Peace Culture for a Better Life

The search for inner peace is a spiritual practice which any one of us may consciously dedicate him or herself to in daily life. It does not matter if one is a Buddhist, or a Catholic, or a Muslim, or a Jew; it does not matter in which god one believes, nor whether one is atheistic: peace constitutes the essence of all religions and all spiritual traditions and is also a universally recognized lay value; everyone – believers and non-believers alike – agree that peace is a necessary condition for all to live happily.

In order to triumph on earth, first of all peace must be rooted in our inner world. Cultivating inner peace means to make a commitment to disarm one’s mind in order to re-discover the pure and original nature of one’s mind – purifying it from prejudice, greed, hatred and all the negative emotions which pollute it and make it be reactive, aggressive and “small”.

Each of our thoughts, each look, each gesture and each action may be ruled by the pure spiritual energy which sustains life. Through prayers, of course, but also through our work, singing, dancing, playing: everything becomes a means for practising peace. In order to fulfill one’s precious human life spiritually, one does not necessarily have to be in a monastery, nor spend one’s days in rigorous meditation exercises: what is indispensable is to remember to sow the seeds of peace in ourselves and our surroundings each and every moment, in any situation, in any place. By taking a commitment to make the flowers of harmony, generosity and joy blossom, we will make the garden of life thrive: thus, we will be able to rejoice in everything – including the planet – and will benefit also future generations.

Anyone, in any latitude, may become an expert spiritual gardener - a teacher or a business person, a student or a pensioner, a domestic worker or an athlete… Obviously, this work requires willpower, humbleness, constancy and patience. But it produces infinite joy. It is the only thing capable of laying solid bases for the realization of  world peace. Our inner field is healed by the awakening with simplicity and love: we begin each new day by purifying our minds from dark thoughts and by deeply strengthening the motivation to transform any negativity into positive. The strong determination to choose a non-violent culture in order to become a peace messenger and to do our best for ourselves, for our families, for our country and for the whole universe will make each instant of our day, a continuous moment of authentic spiritual practice.

Moment after moment, we must educate ourselves to live in peace at home, in the office, bar, school, while we are driving, when closing a deal, when making love… On the doorstep of the third millennium, we must decide to invert the tendency to violence that permeates and may characterize individual lives of any one of us and all cultures of the world. Even scientific research and medicine may be violent; sports and leisure may also become violent, as well as the mass media which become ever more aggressive by emphasizing cruelty and horrors.  Before any others, we ourselves may become violent towards those whom we love and even towards ourselves: we use aggression in order to defend ourselves, we continuously self-destruct due to fear. The degeneration is global and we all are responsible for it: let us quickly change our route, let us invest in peace.

Religions and spiritual traditions have always taught how to sow, cultivate and stabilize inner peace. And the practice of any one of those powerful wisdom methods is adequate even for those who do not have – or who believe not to have – anything to do with spirituality. That is due to the fact that, in these confused and pollute times, peace is the only morality capable of congregating religious and lay people, politicians and scientists, in the name of life.