Jonathan DeHart, The Diplomat: Last Friday, millions of Buddhists across Asia gathered to celebrate a rather hazy date, but one with deep cultural import nonetheless: the so-called birthday of Siddhartha Gautama (better known as the Buddha). Depending on the country, the day is recognized as any time from the first full moon in May to April 8, the latter being steadily adhered to by the practical Japanese.

In reality, “Western scholars would tell you that we don’t even know the year in which the Buddha was born, much less the actual month and date,” José Ignacio Cabezón, professor of Tibetan Buddhism and Cultural…

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Jen Mulson, The Gazette: We all could use a lot more metta in our lives.

The Pali (a Middle Indo-Aryan language) word means loving kindness. Metta meditation is a practice that allows you to generate feelings of goodwill and love for yourself, your loved ones, those you feel neutral about and those you find difficult.

Pat Komarow, a local yoga and meditation teacher, will guide a metta meditation at Buddha Day at Marmalade at Smokebrush on Saturday. You don’t have to be a Buddhist to attend.

“It’s so powerful because it’s unconditional,” she said. “It’s foreign to the Western world…

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Like many Westerners, Mary Bennett turned to Buddhism when the faith of her childhood stopped working for her.

She still wanted a spiritual practice, but one that valued questioning.

“Buddhism encourages you to investigate every piece of information you’re given, and that really appealed to me,” said Bennett, who works in Madison in the field of health care advocacy. “All of us want to be good people, but how? Buddhism provides a path and instruction on how to gain wisdom and compassion.”

It’s a big week for Buddhism in Madison — one of many in the last four decades because of the…

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Tiffany Andras, Opposing Views: As two of the oldest sustained world religions that both developed in and spread from India, Hinduism and Buddhism have many similarities in basic beliefs despite their large differences. Though Hinduism, like other major religions, ascribes to a belief in God, Buddhism does not — one of the biggest points of divergence between the two. However, because of their parallels in origination, there are tenets that form the basis of both religions that make them discrete from most others, with the exception in large part to Jainism and Sikhism which have their origins in Hindu and Buddhist philosophy themselves…

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Daisaku Ikeda, India.com: The Lotus Sutra teaches that all living beings possess the world of Buddhahood. There is not even a hint of discrimination toward women.

The Lotus Sutra teaches that all living beings possess the world of Buddhahood. There is not even a hint of discrimination toward women. To discriminate against others–in any way–is to discriminate against your own life.

In a fiercely discriminatory society, Gautama Buddha staunchly refused to allow his actions to be coloured by distinctions of class, gender and birth, or of lay practitioner and monk or nun. Whether male or female, being noble…

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Madhur Tankha, The Hindu: To give the people a better understanding of Buddhism and its link with Kashmir, art historian Benoy K. Behl has now made a special documentary titled “The Monasteries of Rinchen Zangpo” which will be screened at Tibet House on Lodhi Road here this coming Sunday.

Describing this film as an extraordinary one, Benoy says he had to make adventurous expeditions to the treacherous mountains of Tibet, Lahaul-Spiti, Kinnaur and Ladakh. He discovered not only mesmerising unexplored monasteries but also learnt about the artists from Kashmir whose paintings and sculptures are testimony to a great tradition of art…

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Lewis Richmond, Speaking Tree: I have often written that we are approaching the 50 year mark of Buddhist meditation practice in America. In many ways this style of Buddhism has become well established and familiar to the mainstream culture. Meditation, dharma teachers, retreat centers and monasteries, as well as some core terms (dharma, karma, mindfulness, zazen, bodhisattva and metta, to name a few) have become well known and understood. The influx of Tibetan Lamas has provided a fresh Asian presence to a scene that otherwise is increasingly westernized.

But from another point of view it may seem as though all this activity is…

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Danny Luong, Daniel Ball & Michael Chan, The Calgary Journal:

Calgary man becomes monk in quest for enlightenment…

In a country where non-Christian religions represent only 1 per cent of the total population, Buddhism is often misunderstood.

But one Calgary man is finding understanding by all means necessary.

20-year-old Brandon is a self-described, “white monk” living among mostly Vietnamese monks at Bat Nha Buddhist temple – known by its patrons as Prajna Pagoda – in southeast Calgary.

Brandon now goes solely by his dharma name – a new name acquired during a Buddhist initiation ritual – Prajna Kusala. Philosophy and spirituality…

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I heard a story when my son was in a local Waldorf school, and I loved it.

The children were in art class seated in different tables, working hard at their projects. One little girl was particularly diligent, so the teacher stood behind her and watched for a while. Then she bent over to ask her what she was drawing.

Very matter-of-fact the little girl said, “I’m drawing God”.

The teacher chuckled and said, “But you know, hon, no one knows what God looks like.”

Without skipping a beat, without even looking up, the little girl responded, “They will in a moment!”

This made me wonder, what happened to our wildness? The wildness of God, of …

Harold Mandel, Examiner.com: The Times of India has reported on Apr 21, 2013, Tibetan administration to take over Tibetan schools in India. It has been more than 50 years since India’s first prime minister Jawaharlal Nehru took the initiative to open schools for Tibetan refugees, and now the Tibetan administration in exile is set to take over the 71 institutions which are functioning across the country. This transfer process began this month and will take at least three years to complete.

The Tibetan schools were set up after the first Tibetan refugees came to India in 1959. The schools are presently being run by the Central Tibetan Schools… …