About
Who We Are
Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland is a Temple dedicated to bringing peace and happiness to the world, and to removing suffering, through offering the methods of meditation and modern Buddhism. We are also a 501(c)3 nonprofit organization.
We aim to teach people how to develop pure, positive states of mind, giving them practical tools to transform the difficulties of everyday life into an opportunity for personal growth and transformation. We wish to inspire and empower people to reach their full spiritual potential in order to be of the greatest benefit to their family, friends, and the world.
Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland (KMC Maryland) is a non-profit organization that is part of the New Kadampa Tradition-International Kadampa Buddhist Union (NKT-IKBU), an international association of Mahayana Buddhist study and meditation centers founded by Venerable Geshe Kelsang Gyatso in 1991. The purpose of the NKT-IKBU is to preserve and promote the essence of Buddha’s teachings in a form that is suited to the modern world and way of life.
There are over 1200 Kadampa Centers and groups in 40 countries. Locally, the NKT-IKBU has over 54 Centers with hundreds of branches throughout the United States.
The Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland Temple offers a rich spiritual program for all levels of interest through a variety of meditation classes, courses, special events, and retreats. You don’t need any experience of meditation – simply turn up for any of the programs that are provided.
Explore our website to discover what we can offer you.
Our Story
How did a Kadampa Buddhist Temple for World Peace arise in Baltimore, Maryland?
Buddha originally gave teachings in India, over 2600 years ago. Those teachings subsequently spread to Tibet and other eastern countries, only moving to the rest of the world quite recently. The history of the New Kadampa Tradition in America, and now Baltimore, can be traced to 1977. Geshe Kelsang Gyatso, who lived in India at the time, accepted a request to teach in the West, leaving his home, his Teacher, his family, his culture, and everything he knew to give Buddha’s teachings to a group of students in a castle in the Lake District of rural England.
Subsequently, over the course of the next 40 years, “Geshe-la” as he is affectionately called, worked continuously to help Kadampa Buddhism spread throughout the world for the first time. In 1991, Geshe-la gave his inaugural teachings in the United States to a group of 50 students in Seattle, Washington. Later, Venerable Geshe-la would return to live as a Resident Teacher in Dallas, Texas, subsequently teaching to larger audiences throughout the United States and the world.
In 1994, Geshe-la requested a number of his students to come to the United States to establish meditation centers. Kadam Morten Clausen (who now teaches in New York City) established a Center in Washington DC, and his students soon began classes in Baltimore and the surrounding area. In 1996, the Center in Baltimore was officially established under the name Vikatadamshtri Center and soon moved to a home in Charles Village near Hopkins Homewood campus.
The community gradually grew and has offered instruction in meditation to tens of thousands of people in the local area. As the Center matured, it was re-named “Kadampa Meditation Center (KMC) Maryland” to indicate that it is the principal Kadampa Center in the area. In May 2014, the Center moved to its current location, converting an existing building into the temple you see today. As you can see, the Temple is the result of the efforts of countless people over many years, most notably our founder, Geshe-la.
Thank you everyone for your support, generosity, and prayers over the years!
Vision, Values & Beliefs
Vision Statement
Everyone is welcome to Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland, a Temple dedicated to bringing peace and happiness to the world and to removing suffering, through offering the methods of meditation and modern Buddhism. We aim to teach people how to develop pure, positive states of mind, giving them practical tools to transform the difficulties of everyday life into an opportunity for personal growth and transformation. We wish to inspire and empower people to reach their full spiritual potential in order to be of the greatest benefit to their family, friends, and the world.
We envision Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland as a place where hundreds, and eventually thousands, of people gather in order to improve the quality of their minds, thereby transforming themselves and the society in which they live.
We envision a diverse, joyful spiritual community where everyone is welcome to learn constructive new thoughts, attitudes, and meditations that lead to authentic, lasting peace of mind and mental freedom.
We envision a community of people who are increasingly motivated to love and benefit others.
Our vision is to achieve peace in our world by teaching scientific methods that transform individuals, and therefore society, one mind at a time. In this way, inner peace will naturally lead to outer peace.
Statement of Purpose
Through our courses, retreats, and classes we wish to help people in the following ways:
Solve Daily Problems… Our talks and meditations are designed to solve the problems of modern living, providing relevant solutions to the struggles we all face on a day-to-day basis. Through practical, simple, and scientific methods, people from all backgrounds and walks of life can directly transform the way they perceive themselves, others, and the world in which we live. We offer tools that people can immediately apply to solve their daily problems and become more relaxed, happy, and peaceful.
Heal Mental Pain… The classes provide practical solutions to pervasive mental and emotional difficulties, helping us to heal anxiety, stress, anger, frustration, depression, loneliness, jealousy, miserliness, attachment, addiction, boredom, and confusion.
Cultivate Good Qualities… Through training, everyone can learn how to cultivate inner qualities that lead to authentic, lasting happiness simply by changing their thoughts and attitudes. Through practicing Kadampa Buddhist meditation, we become more kind-hearted, patient, positive, generous, joyful, relaxed, confident, focused, content, peaceful, blissful, creative, wise, and fulfilled.
Change Ourselves, Change Our World… The practical meditations and ideas we teach help people to change their minds, which is the most powerful agent of change in the world. Our experience of our self and our life is a reflection of the quality of our mind; therefore, if we are to change our world, we need to change the quality of our mind. By thinking about ourselves, others, and the world in more constructive, positive, and virtuous ways, we become happier and more peaceful, and as a result, we have a positive impact on our relationships and our world.
Develop Our Spiritual Potential… We have an extraordinary capacity to change. Step by step, we can learn how to tap into this powerful potential that lies within. Gradually, through training our mind, we can reach our highest spiritual potential, the fully awakened state of enlightenment, and be of tremendous benefit to our family, friends, and to this world.
An Inclusive Community
Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland is a completely inclusive community. The tools we provide can help everyone, regardless of age, gender, sexual orientation, ethnicity, occupation, religion, philosophy, way of life, or background. Everyone can benefit from these teachings without exception, and everyone is welcome. The Temple welcomes people from all faiths and those that do not subscribe to any faith. You do not have to be a Buddhist to take part in the program or to benefit from it.
We provide an opportunity for everyone to grow spiritually regardless of who they are and where they come from. We are an international organization with an appreciation for diversity, and with a global vision for peace.
The Enlightened beings, the Buddhas, love all beings unconditionally and without exception, and Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland embodies this quality through our inclusive philosophy. Our teachings are designed to break down the barriers between people, showing how we are all fundamentally equal at our core in wishing to be happy and free from suffering. We provide the methods by which we can learn to accept and appreciate one another, leading to harmony in our relationships and society.
Temple Symbolism
Symbolism of the World Peace Temple
Kadampa Meditation Center Maryland (KMC Maryland) is the main temple and spiritual home for practitioners in the Baltimore area, and is part of the International Temples Project.
Just seeing the Temple reminds us that we all have the potential to experience lasting peace and happiness, and to achieve the highest spiritual goals imaginable. The Temple encourages us to enter into a path through which we can realize our full potential. In this way we can understand that this Temple is not ordinary, but a very holy place.
The Temple adornments are gold-leafed. The use of such precious materials reflects the richness of Buddha’s teachings and the preciousness of the inner realizations we gain from putting them into practice.
As you enter the Temple, pause to experience the peace and tranquility that pervades this holy space. Buddhist Temples are representations of the Pure Land of enlightened beings – an enlightened heaven. Whoever sees them immediately experiences peace of mind. When we experience inner peace we are happy, so Temples function to give happiness to everyone, regardless of their background or way of life.
“Only by creating peace within our own mind and helping others do the same can we hope to achieve peace in this world.”
Temple Exterior
Vajras
The roof of the temple is adorned with 10 golden five-pronged vajras, 5 on each side. These vajras symbolize the indestructible good qualities of the enlightened mind. In particular, they symbolize the five wisdoms of an Enlightened being – the highest spiritual attainment and the completion of the spiritual path.
Deer & Dharma Wheel
Above the main doorways, there are two deer and a Dharma Wheel. These symbolize the stages of the path to enlightenment. In particular, the male deer symbolizes the realization of great bliss, or compassion, the female deer the realization of emptiness, or wisdom, and the Dharma Wheel the union of these two.
Through progressing in this union of great bliss and emptiness, or compassion and wisdom, finally we will attain the five omniscient wisdoms of a Buddha, which are symbolized by the top five-pronged vajras.
The eight auspicious signs (explained below) symbolize in general how to progress along the Buddhist path, and the deer, Dharma Wheel, and top vajras teach us the stages of the path of Highest Yoga Tantra.
The Eight Auspicious Symbols
On the exterior walls of the temple, and on the shrine cabinet inside the meditation room, you will see eight beautiful auspicious symbols. The meaning of these symbols is described below:
Temple Interior
The Buddha Statue
Along the front wall of the Temple stands the main shrine, at the center of which is a large statue of Buddha Shakyamuni, the founder of Buddhism. He showed the manner of accomplishing the ultimate goal of living beings, the attainment of enlightenment, at Bodh Gaya in India in 589 BC. For Buddhists, faith in Buddha is their spiritual life; it is the root of all Dharma realizations.
Offerings
In front of the shrine are offerings that are made daily to the holy beings. We can offer anything we find beautiful or welcoming. Traditionally we offer seven substances based on offerings made to revered guests: water for drinking, water for bathing, flowers, incense, light, perfume and food. There is also an eighth offering, music, which is not represented by a physical substance but is offered when we chant prayers. On most days, these offerings are represented by bowls of pure water, but on special prayer days the actual substances are set out.