MADISON: His Holiness the Dalai Lama addressed the State Assembly and the Tibetan community during his visit to Madison, Wisconsin, on 14 May.
Invited to address the Wisconsin State Legislature, His Holiness was introduced as someone who had included Madison in his first visit to the USA in 1979, who gave his first Kalachakra Empowerment in the Western World here in 1981, and who was here in Madison when he received news of having been awarded the Nobel Peace Prize in 1989. He greeted the members of the assembly:
“Brothers and sisters, it’s a great honour to address you who represent the people of this state. I have been an admirer and promoter of democracy since witnessing the bullying of the Regent in Tibet. I learned about the virtues of democracy and the power of an independent judiciary when I was a boy. These are things to admire. In 1951, I took power and in 1952 set up a reform committee, although it wasn’t very successful because the Chinese wanted to implement reforms their way. In 1959, after escaping into exile, we started to change our system. With the first election of a leader in 2001, I became semi-retired and with the election of a new leadership in 2011, I decided the time had come not only for me to retire completely, but also for the institution of Dalai Lamas to retire from political concerns.
“One of my commitments is to promoting human values in the interest of human happiness; my second commitment involves fostering inter-religious harmony. The third commitment involves Tibet because I am a Tibetan. I used to exercise temporal and religious authority, but now I’m concerned to work to preserve Tibet’s Buddhist culture, a culture of peace and non-violence. This is what I am trying to do. Thank you.”
Earlier in the morning, His Holiness addressed a gathering of Tibetans who live mostly in Minnesota and Wisconsin.
“During this visit to Madison, I am glad to have this opportunity to meet with those of you resident here – my greetings to you all. We’ve been in exile for 54 years, the third generation, but young and old we have kept our identity and pride as Tibetans. The number of people in the world at large who are aware of the Tibetan struggle has increased, and the number of Chinese who are aware of our cause and offer us sympathy has grown too. If the new Chinese leader, Xi Jinping forms his policy on the basis of reality, taking a realistic view, there are grounds for hope that things may improve. Both in Tibet and in exile there has been no slackening of our determination, nor of our dedication to non-violence.”
His Holiness touched on the issue of Dolgyal or Shugden which he said poses an obstacle. If you take refuge in Dolgyal it is an obstacle to taking refuge in the Three Jewels and it also poses a threat to the harmony among Tibet’s various Buddhist traditions. He quoted the Panchen Rinpoche saying that our admiration for other religious traditions should be like the effulgence of a jewel – radiant in all directions.
His Holiness participated in a dialogue on the theme, ‘Change your Mind, Change the World.’