I was just hoping that I'd get to see him some time!!! Hope I can get a ticket.



Dalai Lama to deliver U-M Wege Lecture in April


The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet will deliver a special Peter M. Wege Lecture on Sustainability in April at the University of Michigan's Crisler Arena.

The 14th Dalai Lama of Tibet (click image for high resolution) Photo: Don Farber/BuddhistPhotos.com
The Nobel Peace Prize winner and Buddhist leader last visited Ann Arbor in 1994, when about 9,000 people attended a lecture at Crisler. The April 20, 2008, lecture coincides with Earth Day weekend and is free and open to the public, though tickets are required.

U-M students, faculty and staff will be able to get tickets to the Wege Lecture beginning March 4 at the Michigan Union Ticket Office. The general public can obtain tickets there starting March 5. There is a limit of two tickets per person.

Best known as an outspoken advocate for human rights and global peace, the Dalai Lama will turn his wide-ranging intellect to the topic of sustainability.

"Sustainability goes beyond protecting the environment. It includes social and economic dimensions," said Greg Keoleian, co-director of the Center for Sustainable Systems (CSS) at the School of Natural Resources and Environment (SNRE).

"A billion people don't have access to clean water, and almost 2 billion don't have access to electricity," Keoleian said. "Encouraging individuals to take personal responsibility to address global sustainability challenges is central to the Dalai Lama's message."

The Wege Lecture is sponsored by the Office of the President and CSS. Each year, the center invites an internationally recognized leader to deliver the lecture. Recent speakers include Al Gore and William Clay Ford Jr., executive chairman of Ford Motor Co.

"The University is eager to welcome the Dalai Lama to campus for a return visit," said U-M President Mary Sue Coleman. "He is an extraordinary leader whose unwavering support of human rights and the environment makes him an exceptional choice to address the campus community as the Wege lecturer."

SNRE Dean Rosina Bierbaum said: "For decades, the Dalai Lama has spoken about how 'the world is smaller and more interdependent,' and how we need to 'cultivate a universal responsibility for one another and the planet we share. The increasing urgency of confronting climate change, biodiversity loss, poverty and famine make his message extraordinarily timely."

Other events planned for Earth Day weekend include Dalai Lama teaching sessions sponsored by Jewel Heart, an Ann Arbor-based Tibetan Buddhist Center; The Tibet Fund; and the Garrison Institute. Fees will be charged for the teaching sessions. For more information, visit www.DalaiLamaAnnArbor.com.

Born to a peasant family in 1935, the "Buddha of Compassion" was recognized at age 2, in accordance with Tibetan traditions, as the reincarnation of his predecessor, the 13th Dalai Lama.

When China invaded Tibet in 1950, the Dalai Lama, at age 15, assumed full political power as head of state and government and attempted to negotiate a peaceful solution with Mao Zedong and other Chinese leaders. Nine years later, after the Chinese quelled a Tibetan civilian uprising, the Dalai Lama fled to northern India, where he established the Tibetan government-in-exile.

Since that time, he has worked for the restoration of the rights and independence of the Tibetan people and for the preservation of their culture.

His commitment to the ideals of human rights, freedom, peace and tolerance, and his opposition to the use of violence in resolving conflict, has earned him numerous awards, including the 1989 Nobel Peace Prize.

In October 2007, the Dalai Lama, whose birth name was Tenzin Gyatso, received the Congressional Gold Medal, the highest award Congress gives to civilians. President Bush attended the ceremony and described the Dalai Lama as "a universal symbol of peace and tolerance, a shepherd for the faithful, and the keeper of the flame for his people."

The medal bears an image of the Dalai Lama on one side and a quote from the Tibetan spiritual leader on the other: "World peace must develop from inner peace. Peace is not the absence of violence. Peace is the manifestation of human compassion."

If you get an extra ticket, please let me know! I have to go to this!

What an opportunity! Those who get to go--please be there for many of us who would like to be there. This Dalai Lama works actively to better humankind through a combination of faith and science, and he's what the world needs in this time. Whether he was truly the Dalai Lama when they recognized him as an infant, or whether he has grown into being the Dalai Lama doesn't matter. He is.

Someday I have to see that "simple monk".......

Oh do we need more Men like him. I read his book 2 times in a week. I'll always keep these words of his in my mind, "All Human beings want is to be happy and avoid suffering."
That outlook on human kind is tough to find sometimes.

I AM MARKING MY CALENDAR! I've been wanting to see him for years. Wow.

[ The medal bears an image of the Dalai Lama on one side and a quote from the Tibetan spiritual leader on the other: "World peace must develop from inner peace. Peace is not the absence of violence. Peace is the manifestation of human compassion.]

This is also a message discussed here on Arlo.net, that is that peace is not the absence of violence, it is the eradication of the hate. The Dalai Lama includes the manifestation of compassion. Mahatma Gandhi said, " Let us become the the change we seek in the world." When we connect compassionately with ourselves we are better armed to be a soldier for world peace. [url]www.cnvc.org

Also.. someday when I evolve, I am going to figure out how to use the buttons across the top: Quote, Code, List, List= ,Img and URL!! and the emoticons!

Hey MG,
Thank you for that approved message from the Dali Lama.
When you figure out how to use the spell check on arlonet, please let me know.
In the meantime though, I just got a quote back from my youngest nephew from a quote by MLK jr.
My nephew gave me some mumbo jumbo the freedom MLK was after in his dream.
I couldn't help but tell my nephew that freedom was paid for 2000 years ago by the Lamb, and he doesn't want anything except maybe true Peace-which will lead to love, from it.
I guess while I am here now, the Lamb opened those seals and the white horse could very well have been England.
Though there has to be more to that equation meets the eye.
But I will die saying if I have to that freedom is free, not the bull from foux.-and freedoms comes with a price. (I settle for free.)
When the Lama says, "All any human wants is to be happy and avoid suffering," I was screaming for the Lama.
A real cool dude.

Actually, he was a real cool dude. And pretty funny, too, especially when it came to poking fun at himself. He is a being at peace with his inner self, to be sure! And though his happiness is well documented, witnessing this live was truly extraordinary.

He came on stage to much applause and was introduced by the U’s prez to deliver the 2008 Peter M. Wege Lecture on Sustainability, sponsored by the University’s Office of the President, the School of Natural Resources and Environment and the Center for Sustainable Systems ( CSS) as part of Earth Day, as described above…

One of the best moments, I thought, was in his opening remarks. He sits with his legs folded in his maroon and yellow robes, acutely focused. He is there to talk to a capacity crowd in a sports arena for 2 hours, and starts out by telling us he knows the topic of the lecture is sustainability, but that he cannot pronounce that word, and he really does not know too much about it. I am dead serious! He starts laughing and slaps his knee!

Then he proceeded to talk, dancing from truth to application, touching every once and then on the environment, but pretty much all right- brained conceptualizations. And even though this may sound as if it would make for a completely disorganized lecture, intrinsic to each concept, as a bone is to an arm, was the message of inner peace starts with me. From there it was a quick jump thru the needle’s eye to taking care of the world starts with me. There was purity in it that is rare.

Another moment of brilliance with humor came at the end of the lecture. He allowed 5 questions. If you have seen the documentary of an independent film-maker who was granted 10 questions from the Dalai Lama (beautiful footage of Tibet, historical coverage of the exile, and zen-like questions that sought to belie logic, but which instead brought the Dalai to laughter on many occasion), you know how long it could take to answer 5 questions. And these were long, drawn out and carefully groomed questions, presented ceremoniously by the Dean herself. The last questions asked him – literally – how he would solve the environmental issues of the world !! Was the Dean of the School of Natural Resources and Environment and the Center for Sustainable Systems not listening to what the Dalai Lama just said??

His answer was delightful. He told them, paraphrasing, that that is a question we should be asking you, you are in this school, you are the experts! With that, he received a huge ovation of respect, admiration and appreciation for his marvelous blend of intelligence and humanness. He then gave an elaborate closing blessing that Buddhists present throughout the stadium stood and received. I really did not understand it, but it looked in the same vein as the sign of the cross, but touching maybe core points, mind, lips, soul, followed by bowing. That was the closest that he came to looking like His Holiness, except when he said he knew many leaders of various faiths, and recounted a time when he was with a priest in Fatima, he said he looked at an image of Mary, and he said he saw her smiled at him. Everyone's Happy, except the Chinese protesters!

Oh thanks MG

Welcome back to Pam. It is sad how they are doing the Dali Lama & his people. They need to have their homeland back...

Well, it would be impossible to make everyone happy. It was quite interesting to see FBI agents shooing the protesters out of the parking lot. No violence, I'm glad to say.

More later...

MG describes him very well. I would add that it made me happy to see that he is very human and very happy.