The Clayman Institute for Gender Research

Join us for a screening and discussion of the award-winning documentary BLESSINGS: The Tsoknyi Nangchen Nuns of Tibet. Discussion follows with a rare visit from renowned Buddhist teacher, Tsoknyi Rinpoche III, and filmmaker Victress Hitchcock.  The film documents the lives of the Tsoknyi Nangchen Nuns—3000 remarkable women who live and practice an ancient yogic tradition in remote nunneries and hermitages in the Nangchen region of Eastern Tibet.

 During the Cultural Revolution, all 40 nunneries of this thriving tradition were destroyed.  The nuns returned to nomadic homes, were sent to work camps or didn’t survive. But a few retreated into caves to practice and wait.  Twenty years later, the remaining nuns emerged and began to rebuild. Narrated by Richard Gere, the film documents the journey of Tsoknyi Rinpoche III accompanied by a handful of western students, who explored the unique lives of the nuns.  Tsoknyi Rinpoche III tells the remarkable story of the first Tsoknyi Rinpoche, whose revolutionary idea that women should receive the same teachings as men initiated the lineage of Tsoknyi Nangchen nuns more than a century ago.  The film places the Nangchen nuns’ practice in the context of the largely male dominated history of Buddhism in Tibet.

Free and open to the public. Click here to visit the facebook event page.