The Dalai Lama

He is both youthful and ancient, sitting in his favorite chair feeding parables to the wide-eyed children at his feet. We’re all expecting a Religious Experience, to be Blessed with the Word of His Holiness, the Fourteenth Dalai Lama.

I think that what I heard amounted to little more than a good homily (if, indeed, in my Lapsed Catholicity*, I remember what a good homily sounds like!). Outbreaks of applause indicated to me more that he had said something that folks already knew, what they wanted to hear, than that he had led anyone to the brink of revelation. What I saw on the jumbotrons was somewhat more compelling: he is definitely an animated and charismatic figure; he gestures, almost pantomimes in holy sign language. His English seems at first to be fluent and crisp, but without warning he will switch to Tibetan, pause while his translator speaks, and continue on. He tells us that we should be compassionate and forgiving; and (yes, Miss Mary) that we should be nice to each other, the way we all were during the Blackout. He sits back and shrugs his shoulders. He leans forward again and laughs at us: “Heeeh! Heeeh! Heeeeeh!” he intones gleefully.

Perhaps that’s the hook: His Holiness, the Dalai Lama, has a great and wise laugh. He reminds me of my Grampa when he laughs. He knows he’s “just an old monk;” he knows (yes, Miss Mary**) that he’s not telling us anything that our mothers didn’t tell us. But we all dragged our spiritually hopeful asses out of bed on a Sunday morning and, instead of Brunch and mimosas (and, believe me, the Mimosa Brunch contingent was very well-represented in Central Park’s East Meadow today) we came to hear a twinkly-eyed old bald guy in a brown robe and sandals talk to us about compassion and forgiveness, and he was not going to disappoint. More than anything the DL said today, I was impressed by the silence, the hush of 50,000 or so people sitting in a meadow, focusing (Meditating? Praying?) on whatever message of compassion each held in his or her own mind that they wanted to hear from the DL.

Let's see if Dave Matthews Band can pull off the same thing on Wednesday.


*I thought I was making up a word here, but it really exists!
**If you don’t know what’s going on with this, ask me to tell you about the Dalai Mama.

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