about

It is much, much, much more meritorious to see relics of the Buddha than to see other holy objects such as statues and stupas. It is like seeing the living, breathing Shakyamuni Buddha himself. – Chöden Rinpoche
I was sceptical going in . . . I left there amazed. My friend, who doesn’t believe in anything, was blown away. – Ben Easter
“Never done anything like this before”, one big hulk of a man said as he knelt down for a blessing. With tears in his eyes, he looked up and said, “Never expected that!” – Ani Rinchen

I consider myself a Christian . . . [but] this is for everyone. – Matt

I felt a tangible radiation of exquisite energy flowing from the relics to my heart center. It was highly private and personal, and yet conveyed an immense sense of oneness or unity with everyone and everything. – Dr Misha Manek

I felt a tangible radiation of exquisite energy flowing from the relics to my heart center. It was highly private and personal, and yet conveyed an immense sense of oneness or unity with everyone and everything. – Dr Misha Manek

There is a feeling of profound unconditional love from the Buddha relics; that is the only way I can describe it. – Dr Misha Manek

The Buddha relics . . . point to an amazing concept, and this is very radical: that no physical flesh and blood body is required for a vehicle for consciousness! We are forced to go back to the drawing board. – Dr Misha Manek

[In Bhutan] more than 300,000 people queued for miles and waited for hours. People trekked for days through mountains and valleys on horseback, many by foot, and some even barefoot, to see the holy relics. – Andrea Bridger

[T]he relic of Lama Tsong Khapa emitted golden light to the visitors and members of the Korean Bikkuni Temple. This created a frenzy of excitement that brought around a thousand visitors every day. . . – Carmen Straight

[Lama Zopa] Rinpoche says relics emitting light showed that they are emanations of the absolute guru, the dharmakaya . . . and that relics illuminating is Buddha communicating with us, just like talking to us. . . – Carmen Straight

[T]he relics of the Buddha’s disciple Ananda multiplied – a large pearl relic appeared in the stupa – and even changed colour from dark brown to pure white. – Victoria Ewart

The people come and have the pure mind of faith. They make prayers and offerings with good intention. The result is that more relics manifest. – Victoria Ewart

Afterwards . . . there was a tremendous peace, an overwhelming peace in this area. . . . [W]hen are the Buddha relics coming back? – Sri Natha Devi

Her father. . .was virtually blind. When he saw the relics, he said that something happened to him. [His doctor] pronounced that his sight showed a seventy-percent improvement. – Fleur Chyta

Since he was born he had had a skin disease on his hands . . . his mother washed his hands with the water [blessed by the relics] and by the morning the skin disease had disappeared. – Andy Melnic

Over and over again, I saw people in tears, moved by an energy that was inexplicable but real, powerful but gentle. – Victoria Ewart

The power of the relics was accessible by anyone. It was universal. For me, this was the true miracle of the tour. – Victoria Ewart

The Relic Tour is one way to bring world peace, by changing people’s minds. As His Holiness the Dalai Lama says, outer peace through inner peace. That’s the purpose of holy beings leaving relics. – Lama Zopa Rinpoche

People enjoyed the relics so much, generated so much devotion. Devotion is the source – from devotion come blessings, from blessings come realisations. . . – Lama Zopa Rinpoche

We all have buddha-nature. We all have the potential to generate holy relics. – Lama Zopa Rinpoche

Victoria Ewart

The Maitreya Loving Kindness Tour

Victoria Ewart
Director, 2001–2015

The Maitreya Loving Kindness Tour – which became known simply as the Relic Tour – travelled the world between 2001 and 2015, displaying a collection of the relics of enlightened Buddhist practitioners, including the historical Buddha of our time, Shakyamuni. When it began, it was the only touring collection of its kind.

The relics were displayed almost every weekend of those fifteen years at 868 public events in cities in sixty-eight countries on six continents, from Australia to Argentina, from Kalmykia to Kenya from Iceland to Zimbabwe.

We estimate that some two and a half million visitors were blessed by the relics – as well as the millions more who saw them on TV, on social media, and in newspapers and magazines.

The tour was held under the auspices of Lama Zopa Rinpoche, the spiritual director of the worldwide Tibetan Buddhist organisation the Foundation for the Preservation of the Mahayana Tradition.

The tour was an offshoot of a heart project of Rinpoche’s to build monumental statues of Maitreya Buddha in Bodhgaya and Kushinagar, in India. Maitreya – from the Sanskrit, maitri, which means “loving kindness” – is the next buddha to appear in this aeon of one thousand buddhas. This follows the Tibetan tradition of building statues of the future buddha, thus creating the cause to hasten his appearance in the world.

The relics will be enshrined at the heart of these statues.

THE BOOK

A few years after the Relic Tour began and its popularity was evident, Rinpoche asked me to compile a book about it. He said to ask Tibetan lamas to explain the meaning and benefit of relics and to collect personal stories from both the visitors and the relic managers – I worked with over thirty of them throughout the tour – showing how they’d been affected by the relics.

The stories speak for themselves.

 

THE DISPLAY OF RELICS

The touring collections consisted of 7,458 individual relics from seventy-one Buddhist masters (as well as unidentified holy beings) including four of Shakyamuni Buddha offered by His Holiness the Dalai Lama, and even some of the previous Buddha, Kasyapa. The Buddhist traditions of India, Nepal, China, Korea, Thailand, and Tibet were represented.

There were relics of great Indians such as Ananda, Nagarjuna, Padmasambhava, and Yeshe Tsogyal; Tibetans such as Marpa, Milarepa, and Tsong Khapa; and contemporary masters such as the Sixteenth Karmapa, Dudjom Rinpoche, Kalu Rinpoche, the Lawudo Lama (Kunsang Yeshe, the previous incarnation of Lama Zopa Rinpoche), Lama Thubten Yeshe, and Geshe Lama Konchog. During the events, we played video footage from Geshe-la’s cremation in 2001 at Kopan Monastery in Kathmandu, Nepal, that showed small pearls of many colours being collected from among the ashes.

 

BEYOND ORDINARY

Although the display of relics was overtly Buddhist, the events seemed to transcend religion. They attracted all kinds of people, from many different backgrounds and beliefs – it seemed to me that the majority of the two and a half million visitors worldwide were not Buddhist.

I was astonished by what I witnessed during the fifteen years of the tour. Initially sceptical of the power of relics, I developed genuine faith by observing people respond to the relics with humility and openness, no matter what they believed in, their open minds allowed them to receive blessings.

Buddhists, non-Buddhists, sceptics, Christians, Hindus, scientists – all have been touched by these manifestions of enlightened mind.

The power of the relics was accessible by anyone. It was universal. For me, this was the true miracle of the tour.

BUY

All profits from book sales will be donated to
Lama Zopa Rinpoche’s charitable projects.