Uni Glos RPE Guest Speakers: New Kadampa Buddhism in Cheltenham.

  21st March 2021

This week students examining the sacred landscape of Cheltenham spent some time on line with Opel and Ellie from the NKT Akanishta meditation centre in the city (Meditation & Buddhism in the Cotswolds. (meditationincheltenham.org.uk). The intention of this module was to provide the opportunity for students to actually visit and experience the sacred spaces of a number of religious traditions in the Cheltenham region but of course Covid has impacted upon this profoundly. Despite this every tradition that we have engaged with have invited us into their places of devotion and worship via the wonders of Teams and Opel and Ellie at The Akanishta Buddhist centre were fantastic hosts. We spoke a great deal about the shrine and the images, the central role of communal and individual meditation, the network of other NKT centres around the country and the globe and the importance of the nature of Buddhist space in general. We were then guided through a twenty minute breathing meditation which was absolutely blissful despite being on line. I would like to thank Opel and Ellie again and look forward very much a time when we can visit you in the material world.