In a Facebook Live conversation hosted by Geshe Tenzin Wangyal, knowledgeable representatives of diverse Tibetan Buddhist traditions — Yungdrung Bön, Nyingma, Kagyu, Sakya, Jonang, and Gelug — offer teachings and prayers for the pandemic according to their respective traditions, while transcending sectarian interests.

In Tibetan with simultaneous translation into English and many other languages, 90 minutes. English translation | Other translations

View recording on Facebook (144 minutes) to join the chat

Prayers and teachings are offered by these esteemed teachers:

Pönlop Trinley Nyima Rinpoche (Bön)
Sogan Rinpoche (Nyingma)
Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche (Kagyu)
Khenpo Gyurmey Dorjee (Sakya)
Gyaltsab Rinpoche Choekyi Nangpa (Jonang)
Yangten Rinpoche (Gelug)

The Prayers

Viewers are invited to follow along with these texts:

Prayer of Aspiration for the Continuation of the Teachings, with Pönlop Trinley Nyima Rinpoche (Bön)
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Training in the Pure Realms of the Three Kāyas: An aspiration and prayer by Rigdzin Jikmé Lingpa, with Sogan Rinpoche (Nyingma)
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Refuge and Bodhichitta Ceremony and Others, with Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche (Kagyu)
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The Prayer which Saved Sakya from Epidemics in 14th Century, by Thangtong Gyalpo, with Khenpo Gyurmey Dorjee (Sakya)
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ཇོ་ནང་༧རྒྱལ་ཚབ་རིན་པོ་ཆེ་མཛད་རྣམ་སྙིང་བསྡུས་བཞུགས་སོ། ཇོ་ནང་དུས་འཁོར་གྲྭ་ཚང་ནས།, with Gyaltsab Rinpoche Choekyi Nangpa (Jonang)
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Great Praise of the Ten Acts of the Buddhaby Ārya Nāgārjuna, with Yangten Rinpoche (Gelug)
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The Teachers

H.E. Menri Pönlop Trinley Nyima Rinpoche (Bön) is the head teacher at Menri Monastery in Dolanji, northern India. He is a renowned scholar and meditation master who teaches internationally as well as maintaining his many responsibilities at Menri Monastery. He was born in the remote, high-altitude village of Tsarka in Dolpo, Nepal, into the esteemed Yangton family. In ancient times, a priest of the Yangton lineage was considered a necessary presence in the royal households, including that of Tonpa Shenrap Miwoche, founder of the Bön tradition. H.E. Menri Pönlop Trinley Nyima Rinpoche began his training in 1976 at age 10, completing a series of three-month retreats focusing on tantric deities, as well as the preliminary practices of dzogchen. In 1979 his relative Lama Tashi Gyaltsen brought him to Menri Monastery to begin his formal studies. He received his geshe degree in 1989 from the Bön Dialectic School of Menri and began teaching soon thereafter. In 1992 he was appointed as the lopon (pönlop, head teacher) of the school by H.H. the 33rd Menri Trizin Lungtok Tenpai Nyima Rinpoche and H.E. Yongdzin Tenzin Namdak Rinpoche. In 2018 he led rituals for the selection of the 34th Menri Trizin, including the final selection ceremony of His Holiness Lungtok Dawa Dhargyal Rinpoche.
About Bön and its lineage | About Menri Monastery

Ven. Sogan Rinpoche (Tulku Pema Lodoe, Nyingma) was born in the Golok region of Amdo, eastern Tibet. At age 17 he began his formal spiritual training at Bayan Monastery. He was recognized by H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama as the sixth Sogan Rinpoche, and as a young man was enthroned at Awo Sera Monastery in Serta region of eastern Tibet, the monastery he founded during his first incarnation as Sogan Rinpoche. Rinpoche also serves as the head of Bayan Monastery in Golok. He assumed responsibility there at the direction of his root guru, Khenpo Munsel, a 20th century dzogchen master and teacher of Tibet and a chief disciple of Khenpo Ngag Chung. Rinpoche has studied with many great masters of all four traditions of Tibetan Buddhism. After many years of study, pilgrimage and solitary retreat, Rinpoche left Tibet to continue his studies in India. While there, he studied extensively with prominent teachers and spent several more years in retreat. Rinpoche travels throughout North America and Europe to teach Buddhism. For many years he has taught in the San Francisco Bay region, where Tupten Osel Choling is based. Under his spiritual guidance, in 2012 his students in northern Italy founded the dharma center Tupten Osel Ling.
Autobiography of Ven. Sogan Rinpoche, Dreams and Truths from the Ocean of Mind | About the Sogan Foundation

Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche (Kagyu) was born in 1975 in the Himalayan border regions between Tibet and Nepal and spent many years of his childhood in strict retreat. At age 17 he was invited to serve as a teacher at his monastery’s three-year retreat center. After completing the traditional Buddhist training in philosophy and psychology, he founded a monastic college at his home monastery in northern India. Mingyur Rinpoche has had a lifelong interest in Western science and psychology. In 2002, he was invited to the Waisman Laboratory for Brain Imaging and Behavior at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, where Richard Davidson and other scientists examined the effects of meditation on the brains of advanced meditators. The results of this groundbreaking research were reported worldwide. In early June 2011 Mingyur Rinpoche walked out of his monastery in Bodhgaya, India, to begin a “wandering retreat” through the Himalayas and the plains of India, which lasted four-and-a-half years. When not attending to the monasteries under his care in India and Nepal, Rinpoche spends time each year traveling and teaching worldwide at his centers on five continents.
Tergar Meditation Community | Yongey Mingyur Rinpoche on Facebook

Khenpo Gyurmey Dorjee (Sakya) began reading, writing, and memorizing at the tender age of 5 or 6. In 1996 he was admitted to Sakya College, where he received his Shastri and Acharya degrees. For the past 13 years he has been teaching Buddhist philosophy at Dolma Ling Nunnery and Institute of Buddhist Dialectics, a non-sectarian nunnery near Dharamsala, northern India. On several occasions organized by the Department of Religion and Culture (Central Tibetan Administration), Khenpo Gyurmey Dorjee served as speaker and Sakya representative, as well as a member of a special committee for professional research. He is presently a standing member of the International Association of Non-Sectarian Tibetan Religious Traditions, and served as its chairman for the first and second terms. He considers himself fortunate to have this opportunity to serve the community and society at large. He writes, “My flesh, blood, and bone, and also my lung, heart and chest are cast of the Mugpo Dong lineage. My navel was cut in the land of snow. I polished my knowledge in the Holy Land of India.”

H.E. Choekyi Nangpa Rinpoche, the Gyaltsab of the Jonang Lineage, started his Buddhist studies as a monk at age 15. In 1986, he was recognized by the great master Yondan Zangpo as the reincarnation of the great master Sonam Zangpo, the manifestation of Neyten Bhakula who is one of the Seven Great Sons of Jonang. He has studied in several monasteries including Ghadhan monastic university in southern India and has received many teachings and empowerments of different traditions from some of the most celebrated masters, including many from H.H. the 14th Dalai Lama. In 1998 he was appointed as the abbot of the Jonang Main Monastery in Shimla by H.H. the Dalai Lama and H.E. Kalka Jetsun Dampa. In 2014, under the approval of His Holiness, he was enthroned as the Gyaltsab of the Jonang Lineage by all Jonang devotees. In the same year he founded the Kalachakra monastery in Dharamsala. Apart from teaching the monks of these two monasteries and others in India, he has been traveling throughout Europe, Asia, and North and South America to give teachings and empowerments.

Yangten Rinpoche (Gelug) entered a monastery at an early age, and felt very fortunate there to be able to study Buddhism. In 1990 he was admitted to the prestigious University Monastery of SIRMA and was awarded the geshe degree with honor. In 2008 he was called to Dharamsala by His Holiness the 14th Dalai Lama and was appointed a religious attendant. Since then he has been in charge of a department where he looks after its Tibet section. His responsibilities include regular meetings to with eight masters from other major schools of Tibetan Buddhism, engaging in work and discussion and offering advice. Yangting Rinpoche and his team write and edit courses on Buddhism, for which they consult ancient texts and other reference materials. He works closely with His Holiness the Dalai Lama, who helps him to improve his work. Currently Yangting Rinpoche is teaching in France and has plans to teach all over the world.
Expanded biography | Yangten Rinpoche on Facebook

About the Host

Geshe Tenzin Wangyal is an acclaimed author and a respected teacher of students worldwide. As the founder and spiritual director of Ligmincha International, he has established numerous centers and institutes of learning in the United States, Mexico, South America, Europe and India. Fluent in English, Rinpoche regularly offers online teachings in the form of live webcasts, online workshops and YouTube videos. He is renowned for his depth of wisdom; his clear, engaging teaching style; and his dedication to making the ancient Tibetan teachings highly accessible and relevant to the lives of Westerners.
More about Tenzin Wangyal Rinpoche