At a Buddhist temple on a wooded hillside in Japan, grapes and wine bottles are given as offerings, and the head monk is also the honorary president of a vineyard cooperative.

Officially, it is known as Daizenji, but it has been nicknamed the grape temple because of its deep-rooted links to the history of grape production in the country.

Daizenji is in the Yamanashi region, around 100 kilometres (60 miles) west of Tokyo, which is famous as the home of Mount Fuji, and more recently as Japans top wine-making destination. At other temples, they offer sake, but here, we offer wine. Thats unique in Japan, said Tesshu Inoue, 75, the head monk, recounting the mythic origins of his temple to AFP.

In 718 AD, a famous Japanese Buddhist monk and traveller called Gyoki is said to have met the Buddha of medicine, known in Japanese as Yakushi Nyorai, in a dream at the spot where the temple stands today. In his hand, Nyorai held a bunch of grapes inspiring Gyoki to found Daizenji and establish the local vineyard culture, teaching Yamanashi residents how to make wine for medicinal purposes.

A different legend claims farmer Kageyu Amemiya was the first to begin the cultivation of grapes in Japan, in the same area but more than 450 years later, in 1186. DNA analysis has found that koshu the oldest grape variety grown in the mountainous region is a hybrid of a vine species originally cultivated in Europe and a wild Chinese vine. That suggests it may have followed the Silk Road on its way to Japan, the same way Buddhism established itself in Asia.

The website for Yamanashis koshu valley, supported by the local chamber of commerce, suggests seeds or vines from China may have been planted in the grounds of temples and rediscovered by chance much later. However, it was only in the Meiji era from 1868 to 1912 a period that saw an explosion in interest in the Western world that wine production started in Japan.

With its fertile soil and long history of grape growing, Yamanashi was the obvious choice for the first vineyards, and even today, Daizenji is surrounded by grapes being grown on pergola structures. At the altar, grapes and bottles sit as offerings, while a small shrine conceals an antique cherry-wood statue of Yakushi Nyorai with his famous bunch of grapes. The lacquered sculpture, decorated with gold leaf, is a precious artefact belonging to the temple, and is only shown in public every five years.

Daizenji also sells its own grapes and bottles of wine bearing the temples name.Growing grapes, making wine, its a good deed, Inoue said with a smile.Its good karma.

This story was published via AFP Relaxnews

Main and Feature Image Credit: Photography Richard A. Brooks / AFP

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Unique in Japan: A temple dedicated to grapes and wine - Lifestyle Asia Hong Kong

The valley on the foot of the Ko'olau mountain range in Hawaii is known as the Valley of the Temples. Amidst the lush trees and flowers in the valley resides the Buddhist Byodo-In Temple. Byodo-In, or the Temple of Equality as it translates, is designed to be a small-scale replica of a 950-year-old World Heritage Site Buddhist temple in the Japanese city of Uji. Work on the Byodo-In was completed in 1968, and the temple was built to honor the 100th year since the first Japanese immigrants moved to Hawaii.

With koi ponds, Japanese gardens, and statues covered in gold, its easy to see why several visiting Hawaii include a stop at Byodo-In on their itineraries. If you plan to do so, too, here are a few things that you need to know before visiting Byodo-In Temple.

At most Buddhist temples, youd find a resident monastic community that hosts an active congregation. Byodo-In, however, is not a functioning Buddhist temple. As such, there is no praying or worshipping that happens at the monastery, and Byodo-In serves more as a memorial than a temple where visitors come to admire the statue of the Buddha, stroll through its gardens, and soak in the temples calm and meditative aura. Dont be surprised if you dont bump into any monks at Byodo-In, though!

The Byodo-In temple is open from 8.30 am to 4.30 pm every day, with the last entry to the ground at 4.15 pm. Although the hours during holidays vary, the temple always charges a fee for entry. Adults can buy tickets for $5, seniors over the age of 65 can buy theirs for $4, and for kids under 12, thats $2. The temple also has discounted entry fees for citizens of Hawaii as well as for groups of ten or more. Tickets can be bought at the temple, but buying them online will mean that you can skip long queues.

Flanked by ponds, pine trees, and mountains on all sides, Byodo-In ranks amongst some of the most beautiful Buddhist temples that exist in the world. Youll find flowers in full bloom, fish swimming in the ponds, and sparrows or peafowls frolicking around the gardens. Its only natural that the first instinct of most visitors is to take their cameras along to capture Byodo-Ins beauty. But before you do that, theres one important thing to know: you cant take photographs at Byodo-In without a dedicated permit. Byodo-In requires that anybody who wishes to shoot the temple with pro-level photography equipment fill out a reservation form on its website. The temple also charges a certain fee starting from $4 to $6000 for the permit, depending on the kind of photography people intend to do.

Related: 25 Otherworldly Temples Around The Globe That Give Us The Chills

Going to a temple can be tricky. Some Buddhist temples in the world are known to have fairly strict dress codes, which, when not adhered to, could prohibit you from entering the grounds. Usually, this means long pants over short ones, t-shirts over dresses, and occasionally, you may even be asked to wear a coverup. Byodo-In, on the other hand, has no dress code. Visitors can wear whatever they please, and the temple only asks that they remove their footwear outside before entering.

The grounds of Byodo-In cover 11,000 sq ft meaning theres a whole lot to see inside the temple. It can take up to an hour just to enjoy the gardens of the temple and much longer if you wish to enter its many buildings. Queues outside the main hall where the statue of the gold and lacquer covered buddha sits can take several minutes. Exploring all that the temple has two offer can take at least two hours, if not more.

Related: How Tourists Are Supposed To Dress When They Visit These Strict Countries

While there are several things to see inside Byodo-In, most visitors often overlook the Bon-sho, or the sacred bell, outside the temple. The five-foot tall and three-ton heavy bell made in Osaka is meant to be rung with a wooden log before entering the temple. The sound of the bell is believed to invoke a deep sense of calm and peace, clear the mind of all evils and temptations, and prepare visitors for the teachings that await inside the temple. Ringing the bell is also meant to bring happiness and blessings, so dont forget to stop at Bon-sho before entering the Byodo-In Temple.

The lush garden of Byodo-In is home to many tiny birds, and the ponds are filled with colorful fishes. Visitors can stop by the temples gift shop, buy a bag of bird and fish feed for a few dollars, and spend the evening feeding koi fish, geese, and sparrows out of their hands. If youre traveling with kids, in particular, its a fun activity to add to the list of things you do in Byodo-In.

Considering how big even the small replica of the Japanese temple Byodo-In is, there are several hidden spots that those willing to explore the grounds will find. Hidden inside the temples garden are small pathways that lead to little waterfalls and offer stunning views of the temple from far away. Near the back of the temple is a hidden meditation pavilion which is a great place to enjoy the quiet tranquility of the Byodo-In Temple away from the crowds.

Byodo-In is a huge advocate of art and culture and hosts several local artists around the year. Several musicians, artists, writers, and craftsmen volunteer to display their works on the temple's grounds each day of the week. A portion of any sales made is then donated back to the temple. Those traveling to Byodo-In might want to check out the temples event calendar beforehand to plan a trip to the temple around it.

The stunning gardens, ponds, and waterfalls of Byodo-In are great places for all kinds of flora and fauna to thrive. While you would enjoy gazing at peafowls and 100-year-old koi fish swimming about, you may not enjoy the green gardens so much when you find mosquitos and bugs biting away at you. As is the case with any place where theres so much greenery, Byodo-In is also filled with bugs depending on the weather. You may end up feeling incredibly grateful that you packed some bug repellent before making your way to the temple.

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10 Things To Know Before Visiting Byodo-In Temple - TheTravel

Rajendra Pal Gautam was, until he resigned a week or so ago, a minister in the Delhi Cabinet.He follows the Buddhist faith.

He was present at a recent oath-taking ceremony where thousands of citizens decided to enter the Buddhist religion by reciting the 22-point vow necessary for initiation into Buddhism.That vow includes renouncing the worship of the pantheon of gods held sacred by Sanatan Hindus.

Also read: Attack on AAP Leader Shows That BJP Will Embrace Dalits, but Only as a Cog in the Hindutva Wheel

The theological and social reasons as to why such an oath is taken by those wishing to enter the Buddhist faith are elaborately set out in a book by Kancha Ilaiah, titled Why I am Not a Hindu: A Sudra Critique of Hindutva Philosophy, Cultue, and Political Economy(1996).

B.R. Ambedkar, chairman of the drafting committee of the constitution, had taken the same vow when he chose to leave the Hindu fold in the last year of his life, 1956, along with some 6,00,000 fellow Indians.

But of course, we hear that a case under stern sections of the law has been registered against Gautam for dishonouring Hindu gods and hurting Hindu sentiments.

That the constitution of India guarantees the citizen the freedom to profess, practice, and propagate her religious faith is entirely lost sight of in this new assault on the covenant which Narendra Modi once called his only holy book

Brahminical Hinduism passes off the Buddha as yet another avatar of the god, Vishnu, who forms one of the three of the triumvirate Brahma, Vishnu and Mahesh, even as the ruling BJP has always remained very sympathetic to the Tibetans and the Dalai Lama who call themselves Buddhist.

Historically, however, Buddhists recall the atrocities committed on them by Brahmins, one reason why Buddhism born in India, had to take residence in neighbouring countries.

AAP leader Rajendra Pal Gautam at the religious conversion event by the Buddhist Society of India in Delhi on Saturday, October 8. Photo: Twitter/@AdvRajendraPal.

Such, however, is Indias current zeitgeist that not only has Gautam resigned from the cabinet as a political necessity, keeping the forthcoming assembly elections in mind, but his boss, the chief minister of the Union territory of Delhi, has felt obliged to make the loudest protestations yet of his being a devoted Hanuman bhakt indeed, a sort of avatar of Lord Krishna also to boot because he was born, he says on the auspicious day the god Krishna was born, noting that he would slay the contemporary version of the gods evil uncle, Kans, as the god had done.

This is a troubling instance of how politics in India has taken on the shape of religious crusades.

He further went on to cap his speech with full-throated invocations of the slogan Jai Shri Ram a sort of political hallmark of the Hindutva right wing.

There has been no protest yet by the AAP party in regard to the case lodged against the poor erstwhile minister for simply expressing his constitutional right.

On the very same day, another mass gathering was addressed by an MP of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, Parvesh Verma.

Also read: Delhi Police Probe Alleged Hate Speeches by Hindutva Groups, Including BJP MP

In that address, he can be heard saying that the only way to fix them (euphemism for Muslims) was to boycott the community in toto not to transact business with them by buying from their shops/vendors, and to deny all avenues of labour to their members seeking work.

Such a call may remind some students of the history of how Jews were ostracised in Nazi Germany.

West Delhi MP Parvesh Verma of the BJP speaking at the meeting of Hindu groups at Delhis Dilshan Garden. Photo: Screengrab via video/Twitter/@drshamamohd.

However, for once, the government in charge of policing and prosecution in the Union territory of Delhi (namely, the Modi government) thought it fit to institute a case against the gathering for unauthorised assembly under the innocuous Section 188 of CrPC.

The honourable member of parliament who has sworn by the constitution of India never to discriminate between citizens/communities on the basis of caste, creed, religion, ethnicity, gender, language, etc., has not been arraigned under any provision of the law.

In other words, the politician who merely followed his constitutional right finds himself an accused under severe provisions of a misapplied law, and the other who incited a mass gathering to sectarian hate and bigotry finds himself a free man, at least till the time of writing.

We may recall how, in the wake of the riots in northeast Delhi, another scion of the right-wing, a minister to boot, had incited a crowd to yell shoot the traitors but remains scot-free to this day.

The instances cited in this piece are of course merely two or three among a plethora of similarly discriminatory exercises of state power, but perhaps underscore the appropriation of Indias institutional mechanisms more starkly than many.

India is now alas a Manichaean state: there are the good, and there are the evil ones; the good are those who offer allegiance to the right wing in any shape or form, as satraps of any one of the hydra-headed governmental or non-governmental organisations.The evil ones are those who hold views and beliefs different from or are critical of the right wing.

The state exists to protect and not-too-subtly patronise the first, and to hound and fix the latter.

A substantial rising middle-class opinion thinks this arrangement is most suited to the glory of the realm.What else is there to say?

Badri Rainataught at Delhi University.

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Two Faces of the Contemporary Indian State: The Benign and the Vengeful - The Wire

In 2020, 28% of Japans population was aged over 65 years. These senior citizens, who are increasing in number in a country where the birth rate is declining year on year, were the subject illustrator Isabelle Boinot decided to focus on. In her bookOtoshiyori, trsors japonais(Otoshiyori, Japanese Treasures), she sketches the figures of these elderly people, sometimes hunched and often accompanied by a pet, as they wander through the shopping streets or sit at tables inkissaten, old fashioned cafs that are fast disappearing.

Free from the burden of false appearances that we impose on ourselves for almost a lifetime in order to stick to the norm of the time or to separate ourselves from it at all costs, theotoshiyoriseem to truly be themselves, similar to newborns who have nothing to hide, Isabelle Boinot explains. Over the course of my trips to the country, Ive spent an increasing amount of time observing them, identifying their habits, following them in the street, sitting near them in cafs. In this book, Ive captured these fleeting encounters and brief subjective moments in everyday life in Tokyo, Osaka, Kyoto, she continues.

Otoshiyori, trsors japonaisis therefore reminiscent of a travel journal for a country of the elderly. The illustrator recounts her walks and encounters, paying attention to the finest details which she sketches to support her comments. The reader follows the elderly into their favourite shops, which are captured perfectly by the illustrator, from the employees to the customers via the different products on sale or the dcor. They take the underground and the train with them, scrutinising their posture, their routes and their reserved seats. Lastly, Isabelle Boinots gaze lingerson their clothing style, sketching the essentials for any self-respecting Japanese senior citizen.

The author does not ignore the difficulties that can be encountered by elderly people in Japan, however. The precarious nature of everyday life and the need to continue working beyond the age of 70 are also highlighted inOtoshiyori, trsors japonais. Manyotoshiyorihave to keep working after the age of 70 for financial reasons, and their vulnerability is all the more discreet due to the strength of the pressure not to be a burden on the rest of society, Isabelle Boinot explains.Otoshiyori, trsors japonais is therefore a real journey and not an imagined one to the world of senior citizens, who remain one of the challenges facing Japanese society.

Otoshiyori, trsors japonais (Otoshiyori, Japanese Treasures) (2022), a bookillustrated byIsabelle Boinot and published by LAssociation(not currently available in English).

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Old Age Unveiled in the Illustrated Book 'Otoshiyori' - Pen Online

Kiwi chameleon Francesca (Fran) Fisher knew there was something special about Mexicos San Miguel de Allende recently named the best city in the world when she stumbled upon a scene straight out of a Fellini film shortly after her arrival.

Wandering up a cobblestone street lined with ochre- and rose-coloured buildings, the gossip columnist turned filmmaker rounded a corner to find herself face to face with a circus troupe complete with elephants in headdresses and performing acrobats.

It was a defining moment, Fisher, who now calls the high desert community home, said. San Miguel was exciting, unpredictable, wonderfully visual and exotic the perfect environment for a filmmaker.

I found my peeps as, at that time in the eighties, the town was full of artists, poets, writers and musicians from around the world, and I felt welcome from the day I arrived.

Have you made a new life overseas? Email travel@stuff.co.nz

READ MORE:* The truth about life for Kiwis in the 'city of millionaires' * 'Bonkers' airfares: Why you might be out of luck if you want to fly home for Christmas* 'No rush and no rush hour': Couple swaps 'unliveable' Auckland for Northern Territory 'paradise'

Fisher had been on the festival circuit in the United States for a documentary she had produced on tuna fishermen when she and a girlfriend headed south of the border for some cheap fun in the sun.

The first Indiana Jones movie, Raiders of the Lost Ark, had just come out, and cast a spell that brought the pre-Hispanic sites she visited and had studied at university vividly to life.

Supplied

Fran Fisher described living in San Miguel as a cross between a Fellini film and a Buddhist retreat.

Inspired to start writing screenplays, she rented an apartment in San Miguel after a contact suggested she visit, and soon found herself spinning yarns just a short distance from where legendary painter Frida Kahlo hosted some of her famous salons and Beats poets Allen Ginsberg and Jack Kerouac caught up over drinks at Bar La Cucaracha.

Fisher was so captivated by the physical beauty of the town, whose Spanish-style buildings hug a pink neo-gothic cathedral that reminded her of the Disneyland castle, and the creative community there that she decided to stay longer than her planned three weeks. Thirty-eight years later, shes still there.

Lets say I met my muse here, she said.

Conde Nast Traveler named San Miguel de Allende the best city in the world in its 2022 Readers Choice Awards, praising the rich history that saw UNESCO declare it a World Heritage site in 2008.

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Fran said one of her greatest passions is working with colleagues on a social programme which mentors at-risk youths through the arts and entertainment.

A low crime rate, thriving cultural scene and endless culinary possibilities are all contributing factors, plus some fabulous places to bed down including Rosewood San Miguel de Allende and Hotel Mansion San Miguel by Concordia, the US-based publication said.

Travel + Leisure has also waxed lyrical about San Miguel, describing it as possibly the most charming small town in Mexico with a vibrant wine scene, markets and artisans galore, and one of the best food scenes in the country.

For Fisher, the near-perfect climate (the town experiences more than 320 days of sunshine a year with average highs ranging between 23 and 31 degrees), deeply layered culture, and the warmth, spontaneity and innovative nature of the people are among the things that make it an outstanding place to both live and visit.

And I always love the street life in the evenings the fragrances, music, the flavours The randomness of a Range Rover full of young uber-wealthy Mexican 30-year-olds politely giving way to a middle-aged cowboy riding into town on his horse, with mama dressed to the nines perched on the back, cradling her infant grandson.

123rf

San Miguels historic centre is a maze of cobblestone streets lined with Spanish-style buildings.

Now running a sustainable lifestyle community and wellness resort on the outskirts of town, Fisher described her quality of life as pretty damn exceptional.

I live in a gorgeous valley fed by thermal springs and surrounded by vineyards and high desert landscapes just a few minutes drive from the urban centre of San Miguel. The lifestyle community where I live has a great mix of Mexicans and foreign expats, many of whom are involved in creative fields.

She bought the 250-acre property upon which the community, known as Valle de Los Senderos, now sits from a charro (horseman) whod appeared in iconic American and Mexican westerns, bonding with him over their shared love of film.

While he was initially reluctant to sell, she said on the communitys website that hours of mutual storytelling over a few rounds of tequila helped seal the deal. Living and working in San Miguel, she wrote, is like combining a Fellini film with a Buddhist retreat.

Fisher said that while San Miguel, which has become a magnet for American expats, is expensive compared with other parts of Mexico, it is possible to live and visit there on the cheap.

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Fran Fisher lives in a sustainable lifestyle community on the outskirts on San Miguel.

There are definitely two economies, she said. You can rent a cheap apartment or house for under $300 a month and eat delicious local street food for a couple of bucks. Or you can buy a luxury three-bedroom home with gorgeous gardens, patios and a pool for under $800,000, and dine at a gourmet Michelin restaurant for around $75 per person.

While a few luxury boutique hotels charge more than $1000 a night, a three- to four-star hotel would set visitors back about $75 a night, she said.

A cultural hub, San Miguel has plenty to keep visitors entertained, including multiple museums, galleries and boutiques, and regular festivities.

I can attend world-class concerts on a regular basis, get a great massage for $60, shop at high-end boutiques, and dance the night away with friends under a balmy sky, Fisher said. Or stay at home and watch Netflix, like anyone in the world.

We have upscale shopping malls and lots of cheap street markets. My internet streams well with fibre optics, but best of all - its easy to make friends with similar interests and there are always wonderful experiences to be had, at whatever pace or frequency you want, or dont.

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Fran said it was very, very easy to get to know people and make friends in San Miguel.

Walkable as well as welcoming, Fisher said the city is well set up for singles, who typically dont bat an eyelid at rocking up to bars, restaurants, food and wine tastings, lectures, art and writing classes, and sports and other activities on their own. Another way to meet people, she said, is simply to hang out in the town square.

If youre in a relationship, youre also in luck Its one of the most romantic towns on Earth for couples.

Other upsides to living in San Miguel include the affordable high-quality healthcare, and budget-friendly domestic help, she said.

The crime rate, she noted, is relatively low, but you occasionally hear about a shooting usually between gangs in poor neighbourhoods. Its best to stick to growing your own pot if you must, and not go anywhere near drug dealers. Just sayin.

For Fisher, the toughest thing about life there is that corruption in business and politics is widely accepted as normal. Her refusal to succumb to it has, she said, occasionally held her back in business, and prevented her from giving back as freely as she would have liked.

Asked whether there is anything she thinks New Zealand could learn from San Miguel or wider Mexico, Fisher mentioned the warmth, politeness and tolerance of the people, along with their tendency to embrace lifes simple pleasures without feeling a need to keep up appearances.

Theres such genuine affection between people when they greet one another, and a degree of sensuality that I think can get smothered, or even lost, in such a regulated and slightly sanitised environment as New Zealand and other Anglo societies.

But it goes the other way too. Sometimes I miss the pristine freshness of many parts of New Zealand. The predictability of orderliness in itself can be relaxing, even if a bit boring and uninspiring.

Fisher feels so happy and fulfilled in San Miguel, she has no plans to relocate to Aotearoa, or anywhere else for that matter.

That said, I cherish my yearly visits back to New Zealand to see family and old friends, and recharge the batteries with a walk on a wild ocean beach or through a fresh forest. I can get that kind of nature hit here too, but the travel time is greater, so it takes more planning.

Excerpt from:

'Like combining a Fellini film and Buddhist retreat': The truth about life in the 'best city in the world' - Stuff

Tim Bruns,provided by

Oct. 18, 2022

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Nearly half of American LGBT adults are religioushere's how this breaks down demographically

While faith and religion play a vital role in the lives of many Americans, the number of religious adherents is declining. An estimated 7 out of 10 Americans identify as religious, according to a 2020 Pew Research study. This includes 64% of the U.S. population identifying as Christian, a drop from the 90% reported in the early 1970s. Another 6% are members of other faiths, such as Judaism, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism. The remaining three-tenths of the country comprises those who are religiously unaffiliated, a demographic that only made up 5% of the population a half-century ago.

While the numbers may be declining, most Americans still identify as religious. That said, data indicates that one demographic is significantly less religious than the general population: the LGBTQ+ community. Less than half of all LGBT adults consider themselves at least somewhat religious, according to the Williams Institute at UCLA School of Law, an academic research center focused on public policy pertaining to sexual orientation and gender identity.

The chasm between the religiosity of the queer community and the general population may not be surprising, given the historically complicated relationship between religious communities and LGBTQ+ people. While there is no shortage of churches, synagogues, or other religious organizations that fully...

Religiosity overall

More than 11 million people in the United States identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, or transgender, according to the Williams Institute. Among those who identify with these labels, about 3.1 million consider themselves moderately religious, while another 2.2 million are highly religious. Combined, these two groups comprise about half of the LGBT population.

Those considered highly religious by the study were designated as such if religious practices, such as attending weekly religious services, played an important role in their everyday lives. Respondents were considered moderately religious if they either a) said religion was important to them, but they only attended services once per month or less frequently, or b) said religion was not important, but they attended religious services at least once per month or more frequently.

Religiosity by state

Much like the general population, the percentage of LGBT people who are religious varies by state, with the most religious populations found in the South, particularly in the Bible Belt region. The number of religious LGBT adults in the South is just shy of 2.1 million people, which eclipses the smallest share of less than 900,000 in the Northeast. Sitting in the middle, the Western U.S. has nearly 1.2 million religious LGBT adults, while the Midwest has slightly fewer than 1 million.

South Carolina has the highest share of religious LGBT people at 74%, closely followed by Mississippi, Louisiana, South Dakota, and Alabama. Meanwhile, states like Alaska and Maine are tied with the lowest percentage of LGBT people who are religious, each at 31%, while states like New Hampshire, Oregon, Vermont, and Washington hover just slightly above.

Religious affiliation breakdown

Most religious LGBT adults in the U.S. (over 4 million) identify with the Christian faith, whether Protestant, Catholic, or other Christian denominations. Meanwhile, more than 130,000 LGBT American adults are Jewish, over 100,000 are Muslim, and another 100,000 are Mormon. An additional 420,000 are affiliated with another unspecified non-Christian religion.

The Human Rights Campaign has a helpful resource on its website that serves as a guide for understanding the spectrum of positions on LGBTQ+ equality held by various faith traditions. The list includes an explainer on queer inclusion policies and stances among 22 different Christian denominations, four branches of Judaism, as well as Islam, Buddhism, Hinduism, Humanism, and Unitarian Universalism. Teachings from these faiths can range from full inclusion or celebration of LGBTQ+ people and identities to outright condemnation and rejection of same-sex relationships and transgender identities. It also includes a position that lies somewhere in between, such as churches that take a "welcoming but not affirming" stance toward LGBTQ+ congregants.

Religiosity by race and ethnicity

Black LGBT Americans represent the most religious group out of all races and ethnicities in the LGBT population, with 71% considering themselves highly or moderately religious. Comparatively, only 37.6% of white LGBT Americans identify as religious, making them the least religious of all racial or ethnic groups in the queer community.

These ratios don't vary significantly from those seen in the general population. The Pew Research Center's 2014 Religious Landscape Study shows that 3 in 4 Black Americans and about 3 in 5 Latinos consider religion very important in their lives. Conversely, only about half of white Americans and 36% of Asian Americans feel the same way about the importance of religion.

Religiosity by age

The Williams Institute study indicates that the religious LGBT population tends to skew much older. Nearly 65% of LGBT adults over 65 consider themselves religious, compared to just 38.5% of those between the ages of 18 and 24. For the most part, this aligns with the general population as 65% of all Americans over 65 consider religion very important, compared to only 40% of those between the ages of 18 to 29, according to the Pew Research Center study. A study from the American Enterprise Institute suggests that younger generations are less likely to be brought up in a religious household, and evidence shows that those who were are increasingly distancing themselves from religious affiliation.

A larger portion of older LGBT adults identifying as religious may, at least partially, explain why religious LGBT adults are more likely than their nonreligious counterparts to be married, cohabitating, or in domestic partnerships. About 47% of highly religious LGBT adults have never married, compared to 62% of nonreligious LGBT adults, according to the Williams Institute.

There is a gap between nonreligious and highly religious LGBT people regarding the percentage of individuals married to a different-sex versus same-sex partner. Among nonreligious queer adults, 11% are married to a partner of the same sex, whereas 10.6% are married to a partner of a different sex. Meanwhile, about 9% of highly religious queer adults are married to a same-sex partner, and 20.5% are married to a different-sex partner.

Resources for different religions

Organizations such as the Human Rights Campaign and Strong Family Alliance have assembled affirming religious resources for LGBTQ+ people of faith. These include resources for those coming from Christian, Jewish, Muslim, Buddhist, Hindu, and other backgrounds. Stacker spoke with a few leaders from organizations that support religious LGBTQ+ people from different faith traditions.

Marianne Duddy-Burke, executive director of DignityUSA, an organization supporting LGBTQ+ Catholics, noted the gap between the religiosity of the queer community and the general population, as indicated by the Williams Institute study.

"I was really disturbed about the ways in which so many religions' condemnation or lack of welcome for queer people shows up in that gap," Duddy-Burke told Stacker. "I think that was the most important message of that study that didn't seem to get picked up in a lot of places. If I were a mainstream religious leader, the message to me would be we're really failing our community here."

DignityUSA has been around since the late 1960s and has been at odds with the Vatican for decades over the Catholic church's official position on same-sex marriage and LGBTQ+ inclusion. "We believe in sacramental equality," Duddy-Burke said. "Queer people are banned from marriage or being ordained as priests. In some places, the kids of queer parents won't be baptized. We say all church sacraments should be equally accessible to everyone."

According to Duddy-Burke, as an organization that has been banned from using Catholic church resources and...

Stacker looked at how religiosity breaks down among members of the LGBT community by state, age, religious affiliation, and ethnicity based on data compiled by the Williams Institute.

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Nearly half of American LGBT adults are religioushere's how this breaks down demographically - Huron Daily Tribune

Buddha was a historical person, a prince in ancient India, who left his royal life in search of a truly reliable, lasting refuge. After years of meditation, he achieved enlightenment, and taught others to do the same.

Learn more about Buddha...

Being a Buddhist means trying to bring the insights from our meditation into daily life. Keeping the view from meditation gives us more space to act consciously instead of from habit or disturbing emotions.

Learn more about being a Buddhist...

Thaye Dorje, His Holiness the 17th Gyalwa Karmapa, shares the following message regarding the birthday of Lama Ole Nydahl. Karmapas message for Lama Oles 81th birthday Karmapas congratulations reached Lama Ole Nydahl at the European Center in Immenstadt during his Continued

Diamond Way Buddhism is an international network of Buddhist meditation centersfor people who want to integrate the Buddhist view with daily life and work. We offer a wide range of meditations, from those for complete beginners, through to advanced methods learned in retreat conditions. All Diamond Way meditation practices come from the Karma Kagyu lineage, a thousand-year-old tradition of Tibetan Buddhism, whose teachings have been passed down from the historical Buddha.

The Karma Kagyu lineage has been headed by the Karmapas the first reincarnate line of Tibetan teachers since the 12th century. The 17th Karmapa, Thaye Dorje, lives in India and travels widely to teach his students around the world. His predecessor the 16th Karmapa asked Lama Ole Nydahl and his wife Hannah Nydahl to establish Karma Kagyu Buddhism in the West. Since the early 70s they have started 640 Buddhist centers around the world, in over forty countries to date.

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Diamond Way Buddhism

Kadampa Buddhism is a Mahayana Buddhist school founded by the great Indian Buddhist Master Atisha (AD 982-1054).

In the word, Kadampa, Ka refers to Buddhas teachings, and dam to Atishas special Lamrim instructions. Kadampas, then, are practitioners who regard Buddhas teachings as personal instructions and put them into practice by following the instructions of Lamrim.

By integrating their understanding of all Buddhas teachings into their practice of Lamrim, and by integrating their experience of Lamrim into their everyday lives, Kadampas use Buddhas teachings as practical methods for transforming daily activities into the path to enlightenment.

After Atisha, the Kadampa lineage was passed down through a succession of great Kadampa Teachers including Dromtnpa, Geshe Potowa, Geshe Sharawa, and Geshe Chekhawa.

These precious Teachers were not only great scholars but also spiritual practitioners of immense purity and sincerity.

They placed particular emphasis on the practice of Training the Mind (Lojong) by which all our daily life experiences, and especially all our problems, suffering, and difficulties, can be transformed into the spiritual path.

The Kadampa lineage passed from generation to generation until the fourteenth century when it reached the great Buddhist Master Je Tsongkhapa.

Je Tsongkhapa clarified all the teachings of Kadam Dharma and made them very accessible to the people of that time.

In particular, he showed how to combine Lamrim, and Lojong with Mahamudra Tantra in a unified daily practice.

Just as the union of study and practice was a hallmark of the early Kadampas, so the union of Sutra and Tantra was to become a hallmark of the New Kadampas, as the followers of Je Tsongkhapa became known.

After Je Tsongkhapa, the New Kadampa lineage flourished for hundreds of years, down to the present day.

In recent years, it has been promoted widely throughout the world by the contemporary Buddhist Master, Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso.

By founding the New Kadampa Tradition, the International Kadampa Buddhist Union, Geshe Kelsang has created a truly global infrastructure to preserve and promote Kadampa Buddhism for many generations to come.

Use the menu to discover more about Kadampa Buddhism.

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Kadampa Buddhism - Kadampa Buddhism

Once associated in the United States with the alternative spirituality of hippies and beat poets, Buddhism is now ubiquitous in Silicon Valley. In 2016, tech giant Salesforce set up Mindfulness Zones at its annual Dreamforce Conference, with pavilions where Buddhist monks from Thich Nhat Hanhs Plum Village monastery taught meditation and mindfulness techniques. LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner calls his leadership style compassionate management, which he describes as putting yourself in another persons shoes and seeing the world through their lens or perspective, and claims it is inspired by teachings of the Dalai Lama. Bill Gates took up meditation in private lessons from Andy Puddicombe, the former Buddhist monk who co-founded Headspace, an app which has turned online meditation into a multimillion-dollar business. Google even has its own in-house mindfulness guru, Chade-Meng Tan, a former software engineer who says his program Search Inside Yourself not only boosts profit but also contributes to world peace.

What we see in the tech world is an extension of American Buddhisms adaptation into the US mainstream, a process that has been shaped by influential mindfulness entrepreneurs such as Jon Kabat-Zinn, who claimed to have extracted from the Buddhas teachings the universal essence of Buddhism without the rituals and paraphernalia of religion. Kabat-Zinn popularized meditation traditionally an advanced practice for gaining insight into the ultimate nature of reality as a secular practice to boost mental health and productivity. Now, business meetings often open with a brief meditation session to make sure everyone is fully engaged:a mental hack in service of productivity.

In her new book, Work Pray Code, Carolyn Chen a sociologist at the University of California, Berkeley argues that a new kind of American Buddhism has evolved, one which serves the logic of work and business. Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation, she writes. Chen spent five years studying American tech companies infatuation with Buddhist-inspired mindfulness and meditation practices. She participated in company meditation sessions; attended corporate mindfulness retreats; interviewed personal mindfulness coaches who help CEOs find their authentic selves; and spoke to tech workers who use meditation as a self-hack to improve focus, efficiency, creativity, and confidence. Her book describes a corporate culture where meditation and mindfulness address workers mental and spiritual needs, imbue work with a spiritual aura, and turn workplaces into productivity-centered faith communities.

Chen warns that corporate spirituality is turning work into a religion that replaces community-based spirituality and engagement. In an industry where 70+ hour workweeks are normal, the boundary between private life and work has been erased. Chen describes how tech professionals are dropping out of political and civic participation because their commitment to their companies leaves no time for such engagements outside the workplace; instead, they are encouraged to seek meaning and connection at work. Instead of building friendships, trust, and goodwill within their communities, writes Chen, [workers] develop the social capital of their companies.

Judith Hertog for Guernica

Guernica: In your book, you describe how Buddhist meditation practices have been disconnected from their religious context and repackaged for business. Is there something inherent in Buddhism that lends it to being used this way?

Chen: The Buddhism practiced among white Americans does not have the same structures of centralized authority that we witness in many Abrahamic religions. You could say its been an unregulated market. Especially early on, there was no formal credentialing if you wanted to teach meditation or mindfulness. But there are also historical reasons why this has happened, in particular in the Bay Area. The Bay Area has been the epicenter of this fascination with Asian religions and Buddhism, starting in the late 1950s with the arrival of the Japanese Zen master Shunryu Suzuki, the Beat movement, and then the counterculture movement of the 1960s and 1970s. Many of the people who initially brought mindfulness and meditation to the Silicon Valley corporations were what I call mystics, spiritual seekers who had come to the Bay Area to participate in the great counterculture movement.

But then we saw the mainstreaming of both the tech industry and Buddhism. People like Jerry Brown and Steve Jobs, who had an interest in Buddhism and had traveled to Asia, became the political and business elites, and the ethos and practices of the baby boomers became part of the establishment. Many of the meditation and mindfulness coaches in the tech industry picked up these practices in the 1960s and 1970s. For most of their careers, they were teaching in dharma centers or community centers, but with the rise of the tech industry and the rise of the cost of living in the Bay Area, they increasingly found that they had to service the tech industry if they wanted to survive and make a living. And this came with certain compromises or adaptations to the teachings and practices to meet the needs of the tech industry. I call it trickle-down Buddhism, because their culture became the ambient culture of the Bay Area.

Guernica: You write that most white Westerners know only a particular brand of Buddhism that has repeatedly been altered and adapted to appeal to them. Can you talk more about this process?

Chen: For the overwhelming majority of Asian Buddhists, Buddhism is a devotional practice. Bowing to images of deities, burning incense, worshiping at an altar those are all fundamental elements of Buddhist practice. There is this acknowledgement of worshiping higher beings. Meditation was not at all a mainstream lay practice in Buddhism. It only became popular in the early twentieth century, when Buddhist reformers such as the Burmese monk Mahasi Sayadaw, founder of modern Vipassana meditation, promoted it as a lay Buddhist practice. Mindfulness, as it was practiced for most of its history in Asia, was a very elite practice reserved only for advanced monastics. But Jack Kornfield, who is one of a number of influential teachers responsible for making Buddhist meditation go mainstream, understood that devotional Buddhism would be an obstacle for white Americans. He emphasized meditation because he understood that devotional Buddhism would be too associated with religious practice.

I want to clarify, by the way, that Im not necessarily critical of American Buddhist entrepreneurs. The problem is if you mistake this white American Buddhism for all Buddhism, or claim that this is the right or only way to practice Buddhism.

Guernica: How have traditional Buddhists leaders responded to the Western demand for Buddhist spirituality?

Chen: The Dalai Lama was instrumental in advancing the secularization of meditation. For him it was in part a political calculation. He wanted to make Buddhism relevant and useful to the West. Richard Davidson, a professor of psychology at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, played a key role. In 1992, Davidson traveled to Dharamsala to meet with the Dalai Lama, and they discussed studying meditation scientifically. What ultimately grew out of that encounter is the Center for Healthy Minds, a research center that promotes scientific research on the efficacy of meditation. Talking about meditation in terms of data and metrics and facts has totally revolutionized Buddhism. Theres now a huge body of science on mindfulness and meditation, which has taken it out of the world of spirituality and allowed it to become standard practice in secular therapeutic spaces like hospitals, counseling centers, and schools. You no longer need to be a Buddhist to practice Buddhist meditation.

Guernica: Hasnt the validity of some of this research on meditation been questioned?

Chen: Yes, and I think the other question here, to which I never got a satisfactory answer, is: Why meditation? Why mindfulness? When I looked at additional research, I learned that gardening can produce similar health outcomes to decrease your stress. Or just sleeping more! But nobody promotes those practices in the same way or to the same scale because theres nothing to gain there. Several meditation teachers I interviewed told me that meditation is really hard and difficult to sustain, but here are all these companies touting it and claiming its making people more productive and improving their mental health. Yet there are all these other things that could be equally beneficial that people can do if they just get more time off work. But employers are unwilling to entertain that option.

Guernica: Youve identified a kind of doublespeak that meditation coaches often rely on to market themselves: on the one hand asserting that meditation and mindfulness are secular, science-based techniques, but on the other hand drawing on the spiritual authority of Buddhism. Could you speak more on this paradox?

Chen: Let me first emphasize that I would not characterize the meditation teachers I interviewed as manipulative or dishonest. Their motivations were genuine and came from spiritual experiences they had had themselves. Their concern was to bring wholeness to people and to share their own spiritual transformation with the world. But because of the particular circumstances of living in the Bay Area, in the techtopian ecosystem, they have to figure out ways to monetize these teachings.

For that reason, they resorted to this kind of doublespeak. They felt that in order to market their spirituality, they had to quote the science and use the PowerPoints and language legible to tech professionals. They have to present meditation in secular terms because many companies have qualms about bringing religion into the workplace. These teachers consider this doublespeak as expedient means, which is a Buddhist term that justifies adjusting the teachings to make the dharma accessible to a variety of people. But I think all the teachers had some qualms about being forced to leave the ethical aspects of Buddhism out of the workplace. They were not being hired to make the employees more ethical; they were being hired to make them more productive.

Guernica: Its also interesting to look at it from the other side. If companies are so focused on the secular and scientific aspects of meditation and mindfulness, why are they bringing it in as a spiritual practice?

Chen: For some companies its just a matter of out-perking other companies. On that level, it has nothing to do with spirituality; its just another perk. But on another level, companies are concerned about the spiritual care of their employees. They realize that employees do not perform well if their physical and mental state is not optimal. They worry about burnout. Many HR people talked to me about the spirituality of their workers as a competitive advantage. Human capital is the most valuable asset in a knowledge economy. So how do you grow the value of your capital and increase profit? You invest in your most important asset, which is your high-skilled workers. You try to persuade them to align the deepest parts of themselves with the company. You use spiritual practices to try to get them to love work and completely identify with the company. And the meditation and mindfulness that are being promoted in corporate workplaces are all part and parcel of that.

At some companies I observed, they would teach loving-kindness, Metta meditation, which is a traditional Buddhist meditation to promote compassion. Participants would be told: Imagine yourself spreading your love to your family. And now imagine a circle of love that you enlarge to include all of your workplace, and then all of your community, and then all of the world So, first of all, you might ask, what does any of this have to do with work? But when you associate these practices with your company because they happen at work, you begin to associate this sense of wellbeing and spirituality with your workplace. The social and spiritual binding that happens when you practice meditation together this is what gets people to develop a sense of belonging and identification with their company. It has nothing to do with compassion anymore.

And this happens not just in Silicon Valley. Almost all Fortune 500 companies are now organizing themselves to function as religious organizations. They have an origin story, a mission, ethics, and a particular set of practices, and many of them have a charismatic leader, which are all basic components of organized religion. I would say that this is strategic. They have learned that managing meaning is a central labor practice to compete for highly skilled workers in a knowledge economy.

Guernica: What would Marx say about that?

Chen: (Chuckles) He would say, I told you so! I actually found myself thinking a lot about Marx as I was doing my research.

Guernica: Youve talked about how companies aim to develop their human capital by cultivating a spirituality of authentic selfhood. Is this similar to the individualism that informed the counterculture movement?

Chen: Whether its a countercultural movement or a deeply mainstream American movement, there is in the United States this celebration of individualism and the ideal of the autonomous individual, who not only gets to make political choices and exercise their rights, but also gets to make economic choices in the marketplace. In the spiritual realm, this is expressed as an expectation of an unmediated relationship with the divine and of envisioning the divine as embodied in each individual person. At the core of this, whether its from the left or from the right, there is this celebration of self-fulfillment, of self-optimization, and of the idea of the autonomous, unencumbered, authentic self. Which, by the way, completely contradicts the Buddhist principle of no-self.

Guernica: You call the spirituality promoted by corporate America Whitened Buddhism, which claims to capture the essence of the Buddhas teachings without any distracting cultural baggage. How do the racial politics of the US play into this?

Chen: What we see is the erasure of Buddhism as a religion or tradition that Asians or Asian Americans can claim or identify with. In a place like the United States, there is a racial dimension to what is considered universal. Things like chanting, bowing, devotional practices, robes, incense, or having an altar are considered religious because they are associated with Asians or Asian Americans, while Buddhist meditation practices are presented as universal: something that can cross all times and people and spaces. And this matters a lot, because the universalization of Buddhism makes it marketable for business and therapeutic use. Such supposedly universal aspects of Buddhism are promoted in a secular context, while beliefs and practices associated with a particular cultural or ethnic group are considered to be religious.

I remember talking to someone at a company that brings meditation and mindfulness to businesses. She made it really clear to me that they did not bring in any zany gurus to teach meditation; they offered straight-laced teachers (they actually called them trainers) who didnt wear robes but looked just like the people they were teaching, wearing something like khaki pants and a button-down shirt. The way she saw it, they had done away with the accoutrements of religion that were not fundamental to meditation.

Guernica: Could this desire for a spirituality geared towards ones individual needs explain the backlash against organized religion in the US?

Chen: What we see in American religion, even if it is practiced in a corporate setting, is often the question, How can the group help the individual realize themselves? Whereas in other cultures this question tends to be reversed: How can the individual help realize the goals of the group? Interestingly enough, I think that companies have been able to command great self-sacrifice from Americans in a way that no other institution can today. I would argue that companies or workplaces have become the new faith communities that are replacing organized religion.

But there are downsides to this. We start to organize our selves, communities, and spiritualities around capitalisms goals of efficiency and productivity, ignoring other possible ethics of justice, kinship, and beauty. Ultimately, companies, which are driven by the bottom line, cannot offer us a solution for a flourishing life.

Guernica: What worries you most about corporate control over spirituality?

Chen: Its a problem when work becomes the alpha institution around which our lives revolve. I use the example of Buddhism to show how tradition and practices become flattened, impoverished, and hollowed out because they now serve the needs of the corporation. We see this also in families and in communities where civic participation has declined in the past 50 years. If we look at the economy of devotion in a community, devotion is collectively organized; it is organized around institutions such as the family, or the church, or the temple, or the workplace. But its a problem if you have only one game in town the workplace and essentially everything else orbits around it. This is increasingly what were seeing as we, human beings, become flattened into workers whose value is determined only by what we produce. This, I think, is also whats behind much of the obsession with self-optimization, positive psychology, and the health and wellness industry: we are under constant pressure to boost our value as individuals to stay competitive in a capitalist society. And this also damages our democracy. People are spending all their time and energy at work. In a place like Silicon Valley, the workplace takes care of workers needs, but it also claims all their employees time, energy and devotion, so that they have nothing left to give outside work.

I think this is where traditional religions have a role to play. To be sure, religious affiliation and participation is on the decline, and extreme groups like white Christian nationalists have monopolized Americas popular conversation on religion. But religion still is a powerful vehicle for social justice, especially among people of color think about the role of religion in the civil rights movement, the United Farm Workers movement, or immigration reform. But religions have articulated traditions and practices of meaning and purpose and of community and kinship that can counteract the extremely individualized, decontextualized, secular kind of spirituality that is being marketed today.

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Carolyn Chen: Buddhism has found a new institutional home in the West: the corporation. - Guernica Magazine

After the Mahaparinirvana of Shakyamuni Buddha, his profound non-sectarian, universal teachings were not confined to the borders of India but rather travelled throughout Asia, crossing the paths of oceans, deserts and mountains and reaching to the rest of the world.

In the North-West of India, a network of ancient trade routes popularly known as Silk Route originated during the 2nd century A.D. It was used by different sections of people like merchants, traders, scholars, monks and missionaries etc. with which different ideas, culture, art and scriptures also travelled along.

One of the essential philosophies that transmitted through this route was the Buddha Dharma. The dissemination of Buddhism and Buddhist art was launched from northwestern India to modern Pakistan, Afghanistan, Central Asia, Xinjiang (Chinese Turkistan), China, Korea and Japan.

The transmission of Buddha Dharma from the North-West region of the Indian sub-continent to other land is incomplete without mentioning the royal patronage of King Ashoka of Maurya Empire, King Menander and King Kanishka of the Kushan Empire.

In Buddhist history, King Ashoka is considered as the first great royal patron of Buddhism post the Mahaparinirvana of Shakyamuni Buddha. It was through his efforts and determination that Buddhism came to occupy a prominent position in both India and abroad. Buddhism was the first religious philosophy that transmitted along the Silk Route from India to Gandhara region, Central Asia up to China.

According to Buddhist historical sources, King Ashoka organised the Third Buddhist Council under the chairmanship of Moggaliputta Tissa at Pataliputra (now Patna) in 247 B.C.

This council was conducted to preserve Buddhas teaching in its purest form. Post this council, it was decided to send Buddhist religious missionaries to different parts of the world. Consequently, King Ashoka sent out Buddhist missionaries to countries outside India through land and sea routes, thus reaching the lands west of India in Central Asia and South costal countries like Sri Lanka.

Historical sources mentioned that he deputed monk Majjhantika to travel to Kashmir and Gandhara region though which Buddhism eventually reached China and thereafter further flourished up to Korea and Japan. Besides, he also sent his son Mahindra and daughter Sanghamitra to the southern countries as far as Sri Lanka.

As Ashokas empire extended to the northwestern borders of Punjab, the Buddhist monks were free to move throughout the region.

An ancient Khotanese tradition credits Vijayasambhava, a grandson of King Ashoka, for introducing Buddhism in Khotan. According to this tradition, Arya Vairocana, a Buddhist scholar from India, came to Khotan and became the preceptor of the Khotanese King.

With this the first Buddhist monastery in Khotan was erected in 211 B.C. Thus, during the Ashokan period, Buddhism emerged as a distinct religion with great potential for expansion.

After the decline of the Mauryan Empire, the Greeks established its suzerainty over Afghanistan and the north-western region of India. Among the Greek rulers, the account of King Menander (also known as Milinda) is found in the Pali Buddhist literature called Milinda Panha (Question of Milinda). This text records a dialogue between King Menander and Indian Buddhist monk Nagasena where the latter through his masterly skill was successful in resolving the doubts of the King that ultimately led him to embracing Buddhism.

It says the King made donations to Sangha and also built a monastery called Milinda-vihara and gifted it to Nagasena. Besides, the Buddhist wheel of Dharmachakra was found on the coins of Menander period and the king remained a great patron and supporter of Buddhism till his last breath.

Subsequently, the foundation of Buddhism along the Central Asian route was further strengthened by King Kanishka of the Kushana Empire whose suzerainty was stretched from todays Hindu Kush to Kabul, Gandhara, northern Pakistan and north-west India.

Therefore, a ceaseless missionary activity was carried out from north-west India to the regions along the Silk Route. Buddhist history records that King Kanishka played a vital role in the history of Buddhism. Under his patronage, the fourth Buddhist Council in Kashmir was convened, which was presided over by Vasumitra and Ashvagosha.

Also, during his period a new style of Indo-Greek art known as Gandhara Art was developed that flourished mostly in Punjab and north-western India. An example of this art is very much alive in the form of Buddhist paintings and statues in the Himalayan region of Ladakh.

Thus, the ancient trade route played a significant role in disseminating Buddhism beyond the Indian territory. Buddhist art that originated on the Indian subcontinent played a vital role in the proliferation of Buddha Dharma to Central Asia and Far East countries, thereby adapting the local style and norms in each new host country.

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Buddhism along the Silk Route - CanIndia News