Tibetan Buddhist Spiritual Support for the Dying

{xtypo_quote}Master, how do I prepare for death?
Learn to live.
How shall I learn to live?
Prepare yourself for death. {/xtypo_quote}

TBSSD is a newly formed support group with the aim of providing what is seen as an increasingly needed service for the Tibetan Buddhist community of Adelaide. Our mission is:

To promote an awareness of the inevitability of death and the need to prepare for it now, and to facilitate the provision of spiritual support at the time of death in accordance with Tibetan Buddhist practices.

TBSSD is in its infancy and is very much a work in progress. We envision the type and level of services we will be able to offer developing over time. The goal of our initial phase of development is to set up a resource centre at Buddha House consisting of printed and digital information related to death and dying, CD's of prayers and practices, ritual substances used at the time of death and a directory of Lamas and monasteries available to make prayers for the dead and dying as well as funeral celebrants.

We envision subsequent phases will include training workshops on death and dying, working with selected funeral parlours in developing a specifically Tibetan Buddhist funeral, information on living wills, a registry detailing an individual's instructions (or spiritual will) to be implemented at the time of their dying. We hope to facilitate training for spiritual support providers who will assist the dying person.  

TBSSD will not provide physical support/care for the dying. We hope instead to set up the infrastructure so that we can all make informed decisions and choices for our own death and know the appropriate prayers and practices to help our friends and relatives.

If you have expertise in any of the above areas, information regarding them or materials that you feel would be of use to our resource centre that you would like to offer, we would appreciate hearing from you. You can email   This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it or speak to any of the committee members Ven Jamyang, Jampa Gendun, Lyndy Abram, Jan Vaughan, Natalie Kagan, Paul Schultz.
 

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