15th Sakyadhita International Conference Workshop: Mindful Chinese Calligraphy with Esther Liu

This calligraphic work was created by elders tutored by Esther Liu.

Chinese calligraphy is the simplest artistic endeavor, being composed of black dots and strokes. The beauty of strokes, composition and integration create various kind of charm in the implicit and symbolic artistic expression.

15th Sakyadhita International Conference Workshop: Hatha Yoga with Lyudmila Klasanova

Yoga is a practice of mind and body. The primary goal is to gain balance in one’s life and provide a sense of calmness and inner peace. Like other meditative movement practices used for health purposes, various styles of yoga typically combine physical postures (asanas), breathing techniques (pranayama), relaxation (yoga nyidra), concentration (dharana), and meditation (dhyana).

15th Sakyadhita International Conference Panel: Kwong-Chuen (Kenneth) Ching on Filial Piety in Buddhism

Perfection of Filial Piety in Buddhism: A Study of Lady Clara Ho’s Social Welfare Activities in Hong Kong

Lady Clara
Photo Credit: BuddhistDoor

Lady Clara Ho’s social welfare activities to benefit Buddhism and society in Hong Kong during the 1920s and 1930s in Hong Kong are well known. Her early contributions included providing Buddhist education for nuns and laywomen, and general education for the poor. Later, she established Tung Lin Kok Yuen as a permanent institution for propagating Buddhism.

The strict application of traditional academic disciplines such as sociology, psychology, and anthropology to explain religious behavior tends to reduce research findings to collective behaviours and neglect individuals’ search for meaning in the religious context. Some theorists using liberal feminist methodologies have also been critiqued for neglecting to study individuals’ everyday lives. This research gap may also extend to the study of Lady Clara’s social welfare activities.

15th Sakyadhita International Conference Workshops: Eva Yuen on ZenVisual

Ways of Seeing - 2014 Eva Yuen Solo Exhibition

The Art ZenVisual workshop- the ways of seeing through sketching

Aim: participants learn about the cognitive process of seeing through sketching, which involves perception and conception, so to understand how to look into the intangible qualities of the objects and how to record such observation visually.

15th Sakyadhita International Conference Workshops: Ruth Richards and Vivian Ting Chuk Lai on Chaos Theory, Gender & Buddhism

Designed by Chevanon - Freepik.com

 

Chaos, Creativity & Gender

Do join us for a new type of dialogue we hope can help transform society. Our manifest world is full of change, complexity, and surprise. It is not all linear, predictable, or due to limited factors showing simple, or controlling relationships. We are all profoundly interconnected and interdependent, as Buddhists know well. This is now becoming more clear to Western science due to advances including Chaos and Complexity Theory. At a metaphorical level, such advances can be used in engaging and colorful ways to open up and advance understanding of our mutual effects on each other (all of us), the multiplicity and unpredictability of factors in our lives, the wonder and humility of emergent systems and events, the importance of lovingkindness, compassion, equanimity and sympathetic joy, and other spiritual virtues as we advance together, our roles as “open systems” in dynamic interaction, and features that at once honor modes where women have brought great value and benefit, while revealing other areas of stereotyping and gender polarization in society. Women and men alike can benefit.

15th Sakyadhita International Conference Workshop: Rotraut Jampa Wurst on Sakyadhita Herstory, LGBTQQI, Buddhist Women and Science Fiction, and Dharma Rap

Rotraut Jampa Wurst leading the Dharma Rap Workshop at the 14th Sakyadhita International
Conference held in Yogyakarta, Indonesia in 2015. Photo by Olivier Adam.

The 15th Sakyadhita International Conference on Buddhist Women

What an auspicious conference we will celebrate in Hong Kong in 2017! You know, it's Sakyadhita's  30th Anniversary!!! Unbelievable, isn´t it? Thank you to Venerable Karma Lekshe Tsomo, who keeps this wonderful project going over so many years, as founder, former Sakyadhita International President, and also as the one who is taking care for all the Sakyadhita branches around the world.

We all, my Sakyadhita sisters, we have to meet on this very, very special Sakyadhita conference, and we have to share Sakyadhita's herstory.