Comments on: Is that a Kata in your Pocket, Mr. President, or are you just Sacred to see me?

By: Obama's Inaugural Buddhist Connection | Infinite Smile

Obama's Inaugural Buddhist Connection | Infinite Smile — Sun, 31 Oct 2010 20:26:33 +0000

[...] today, elephant journal reported that Obama was keeping a prayer shawl from the Dalai Lama in his pocked during the [...]

By: Banning

Banning — Sat, 11 Sep 2010 01:10:22 +0000

Hey, identified your site by accident undertaking a investigation on Yahoo but I?ll definitely be coming back. ? How can I believe in God when only final week I bought my tongue caught inside the roller of an electric typewriter?

By: Mister Khampa

Mister Khampa — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 15:13:58 +0000

p.s. the word “not” shouldn’t be in the last sentence of my last post.

p.p.s. — the someone would send an email to sangha-announce and ask that it be kept “close” is like posting a flyer on a public kiosk and asking the same. Do people really believe that sangha-announce represents some sort of “close” sangha? Anyone can get on sangha-announce and there are a number of recipients to it that are hostile to the Shambhala sangha.

By: Mister Khampa

Mister Khampa — Mon, 26 Jan 2009 15:07:55 +0000

Once an email goes out to more than one person there’s really no way to keep it confidential — that’s just reality. I’m not coming from a moral or judgmental place on that. That’s just the way it is. It would be like sending a postcard (not sure people under 40 know what I’m talking about here) to several people with a note at the bottom asking them not to keep the information confidential.

By: elephant journal editorial dept

elephant journal editorial dept — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 04:26:06 +0000

Dear Julie B,

It was actually given permission from the friend, this post you’ll find is entirely separate in terms of source from Melissa’s sangha-announce post. Thanks for your concern, however, it’s important to be confidential when asked.

Yours,

Waylon

By: Julie B

Julie B — Sun, 25 Jan 2009 02:45:04 +0000

My understanding is that there was a request to hold the information closely, if indeed it was true. Yes, it was posted to Sangha-announce (not the best way to hold information closely, admittedly).

Why couldn’t that be honored?
There were more reasons not to repeat it on a public blog than there were to repeat, AFAIK.

By: Mister Khampa

Mister Khampa — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 05:22:59 +0000

Lumping hindus and christians together as “believers” might make sense to buddhists but makes no sense at all to christians — I promise you. Hindus are pagans and, as such, are non-believers from a christian point of view. From a jewish and muslim point of view, buddhists are idolators (as well as hindus and catholics). The only folks who believe in the togetherness of all these groups are probably universalist unitarians, god bless their sweet hearts.

By: Mister Khampa

Mister Khampa — Sat, 24 Jan 2009 05:15:31 +0000

I just googled this story again and I’m disturbed to find it listed on various Shambhala sites. Are we moonies or what? Yeah, wow, like we are so excited about any rumor that might show we’re on the right side. What happened to hard-headed-no-spiritual-materialism approach — buddhadharma without credentials. If we’re going to be a beacon to the world we better stopped acting like this.

By: admin

admin — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 16:08:47 +0000

Amen, Mister Khampa, I find it hard to believe…that said I took no offense that we weren’t mentioned, as you yourself said we play almost no active role in politics, for better and worse. We are non-believers, however, non-theistic at least…so we got a (very) indirect shoutout.

By: Mister Khampa

Mister Khampa — Thu, 22 Jan 2009 13:23:14 +0000

I have to wonder why Obama would have gone to the trouble of carrying a buddhist ceremonial item in his pocket for this event and then not include Buddhists when he listed the world’s religions in his address.

As a Buddhist, I find these kind of rumors embarrassing. It comes off as another attempt by Buddhists to inject or associate themselves with a powerful event they basically had no ordinary connection with. It makes the sangha look foolish and hurts our credibility.