Hold the phone: The Karmapawill visit America in May

The 17th Gyalwa Karmapa, the head of the Kagyu lineage of Tibetan Buddhism, will make appearances in New York City, Woodstock NY (location of Karma Triyana Dharmachakra monastery), Boulder CO, and Seattle. The Karmapa's tour will run from May 15 until June 2.

This visit has anticipated for years, and I hope it will bring a flowering of awareness and education for many, many people. Some will recall that we visited Bodhgaya, India, during the Kagyu prayer festival in January. I had the closely held hope that I might see the Karmapa at that event, but I don't know if he was even in attendance when we arrived.

Anyhow, to explain why I consider this news to be so compelling, allow me to transmit something from the original source:

"In mid-May, a serious young man of 22 who is revered as the 17th Karmapa -- now the second-most-important figure in Tibetan Buddhism -- will make his first visit to the United States. The trip comes eight years after his dramatic flight to India from a monastery near Lhasa at the end of 1999, when he was just 14 years old. This is the first time that a skittish India has allowed him permission to travel abroad. His flight from Tibet was a considerable embarrassment to China.

"In a thriller that is already a legend among Buddhists, the Karmapa and two fellow monks drove in secret from Tsurphu Monastery, north of Lhasa, to the remote and rugged border of Mustang, a former Buddhist kingdom now part of Nepal. From there he and his companions made a dash by horseback to the nearest Nepali airport, from which they were able to fly unnoticed via Katmandu to Delhi. The Karmapa, born Ogyen Trinley Dorji, arrived unannounced in Dharamsala, the Dalai Lama's base, in January 2000, and has remained under the watchful eye of the Tibetan leader since.

"This is a significant milestone for Tibetan Buddhists and a momentous one for Western practitioners. The young lama's predecessor, the 16th Karmapa, visited the United States on numerous occasions and had established in the 1980s a part-time American seat in Woodstock, New York, at the Karma Triyana Dharmachakra center. After the young Karmapa's flight from Tibet, the Woodstock monastery immediately geared up to welcome him, even designing furniture to match his sturdy frame. Then they waited, and waited and waited. He will now finally get to see their work. The Karmapa's American followers would like to have him establish his base in the United States, making him the first Asian religious leader of that magnitude to live in the West."