Lama Kathy Dharma Blog: Face to Face with Stunning Beauty
The look on her face was nothing short of enchanting; she seemed to chase away all cares with that look of confidence and grace. Holding the vajra in her hand, she seemed to be indicating the nearness of compassion and truth; once one began looking at her, it was hard to look away.
But then I had to hand her over to the photographer, and our moment together was at an end.
It felt like that over and over again some weeks back, when a crew of merry volunteers from Columbus KTC crawled all over the home of Kim and Bill Miracle on the Far East Side, cataloguing, photographing and carefully weighing and measuring dozens of beautiful statues, paintings and art pieces donated to the center.
The fruits of their labors can be seen this week on the auction site eBay, where Columbus KTC has been holding its first-ever Charity Auction to benefit the Columbus KTC Rebuilding Fund.
The Charity Action ends late Thursday evening/early Friday morning (see eBay listings for exact time), and can be found here.
Here is how we came to have this wonderful event.
After our home in an old church building on Grubb Street in Franklinton was destroyed by fire in January 2016, gifts of all sorts flooded into Kim’s home. As the Director of the KTC, she heads up the effort to rebuild, and the gifts were seen as tokens of hope by people who knew we’d lost not quite half or our statues and virtually all of our sacred paintings in the fire. (In fact, just one little thangka scroll painting survived, because it had been taken off display and was stored rolled-up in the library. Auspiciously, it was a painting of Green Tara, the compassionate feminine bodhisattva who removes obstacles.)
As we looked at the bounty, we were touched, but unsure how to honor the gifts we had been given. Should we keep them? If so, where would we keep them? Should we display them? What was the best way to make use of the beautiful gifts?
As we were mulling over these questions, our spiritual guide Khenpo Karthar Rinpoche sent us a message: we didn’t need to worry about getting new statues for the shrine in our new building – he himself was going to provide us with all new statues and paintings for our shrine. It was such exciting news; we were overcome with joy.
This also gave us an answer as to what we could do with our gifts; we could turn them into steel frames and wallboard for our new building!
So we saved aside some pieces to use in our future library shrine, and prepared the rest for listing on eBay.
You can see the beautiful thangka of the wisdom Bodhisattva Prajnaparamita I described in my first paragraph (it’s Item 64 in the auction) as well as door curtains, malas, and other wonderful items that can beautify your shrine room and home. Some are blessed and consecrated, and will bring great blessing wherever they are displayed. And through purchasing them you will be supporting the floorboards and library shelves and kitchen appliances in a brand-new KTC.
Some items are just $5; others go much higher. But what is most important is that the circle of love started by the donors will be completed when the purchasers when they install them in their shrine rooms and homes.
The love being directed toward Columbus KTC since our tragedy has been astonishing; it has filled the halls of our temporary meeting space at Congregation Tifereth Israel and filled our hearts, as well. Because we believe in the power of karma and the power of our donors’ pure intentions, we know that all will be filled with merit and virtue in the days, weeks, months and years ahead. You are our family in the dharma, and we treasure you all!
HELP the KTC – join in and share the auction with interested family and friends this week by clicking here. Thank you and may all beings benefit.