You see, China seized Tibet, proclaimed ownership, and attacked Tibetan Buddhism, a potential source of trouble. Traditionally, the Tibetan monks chose their own leader, their Dali Lama, through an exquisite ritual honoring their belief that the Dali Lama reincarnates over and over.
No, said China, we are picking your next divine head. And they have.
What we have here is the blatant rape of freedom of religion, backed by extremely violent oppression. Two monks made the most excruciating and heartfelt statement they could. It made the newspapers, at least the Washington Post:
A Great Shriek of Agony
The current Dali Lama is a Nobel Peace Prize winner, famous throughout the world. He faces a nightmare: the destruction of a spirituality going back to 650 AD. If Tibetan Buddhism is stolen and disfigured by China, it will happen under his tenure.
Quoting the article:
On Saturday, the 76-year-old Nobel Peace Prize laureate said that if he is to be reincarnated he will leave clear written instructions about the process. He said in a statement that when he is “about 90” he will consult Buddhist scholars to evaluate whether the institution of the Dali Lama should continue at all.
The United States has issued a tepid statement that dares not challenge Chinese Communist expansionism. Supposedly the champion of freedom, the tenets of which are emblazoned in the Bill of Rights, the USA is far more interested in money than decency. If monks burn themselves to defend the cause of freedom of religion, it means nothing weighed against economic factors.
For a long time, the people of the United States have been buying goods made in China because it saves them cash. In other words, the people of the United States could care less about supporting freedom of religion, if it doesn’t affect them directly.
Due to ignorant and selfish penny-pinching, the US citizen has made China stronger and stronger, until now it is inevitable that Chinese policy will soon dominate the Earth. The good people of the USA have prostituted their own Constitution to save a buck.
The leadership of the US does nothing. The people do nothing.
Baah Baah Baah.
Didn't the same thing happen in Europe, denial and greed, while Hitler rose to power?
Until and unless humanity puts virtue above money, it will continue to suffer due to its ethical immaturity, its failure to rear its collective head out of the muck of myopia, its pathetic inability to take the obvious enlightened path.
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I can remember that Pope Benedict XVI flatly refused to meet the Dalai Lama - I don't suppose that that bit of news went very far either.
ReplyDeleteMind you it was the RC Church under Pius XII who helped 2,000 top Nazis (and their loot) to escape with new identities to South America following the visit of Eva Peron to Madrid, Rome and Switzerland. We can't expect too much help from the world's so-called spiritual leaders if history is anything to go by.