An update to our recent expose on Shambhala - here is the most recent blog post from Chris Chandler, Author of Enthralled: The Guru Cult of Tibetan Buddhism.
"Recently, I have been receiving comments on my last post, “
Divide and Conquer’
suggesting that it was the mental state of the person and her CAT
story that caused it to be removed from Facebook, and because it
“couldn’t be corroborated.”
Couldn’t be corroborated by the same inner circle; same people who
have enabled the sexual abuse for the last forty years and counting?
So, now comes the ‘crazy neurotic woman’ defense of the perpetrators
and enablers. The usual one. I realize there are a lot of aspects to
this CAT story. I also know, having been inside this group, that I
shudder at the thought of what it must have done to your mental state to
be one of Trungpa’s seven wives .
All of his other six wives and their mental states should be
questioned for still keeping the secrets. In fact every one’s mental
state , who is still in this cult, after what has been revealed about
their leaders and their inner circle in Shambhala, should be evaluated,
if they aren’t running for the exit and shouting “No More!”
What about the mental state of all the parents in this group, that
let their own children be sexually groomed, their fellow cult members
be sexually exploited on a massive scale, and their leader keep a harem
of seven wives, illegally, while his Regent infected his students with
AIDS, one of them dies, and they never even think to go to the police?
What kind of group mental state is THAT?
That is the question that should be asked.
Of course, the CAT story couldn’t be corroborated. Who, part of that
inner circle of Trungpa’s who were there, during the most ‘secret part’
of his Tantric teachings on ‘no good-no bad’; his most deeply
cult-controlled members, who formally vowed to him and the group to
‘never reveal the secrets of the Vajrayana or may I shrink up and rot”
are going to support her? Or corroborate her story?
I took that vow; they all take that vow, and unless some other brave
soul tells the truth, which is now unlikely, this requires an
investigation at the level of what is happening with the Catholic
Church, whose members are clearly not as mentally disturbed nor
cult-controlled as those in these guru-worshiping groups, like
Shambhala International. THAT is the big difference between the sexual
abuse in the Catholic Church and in these Tibetan Lamaist cults like
Shambhala. The Catholics actually go to the police. Shambhala’s abuse, it should be clear by now, requires an outside investigation, just as the Catholic Church.
My article is not about the person who blew the whistle on Trungpa (
as great a ‘sin’ in their group as mine is for writing a book about him
and all of them and so we must be destroyed, defamed, smeared and made
unimportant) it is about how these Tibetan Lamas ALWAYS are let off the
hook, because of their very large enabling system; that always
surrounds them. Bigger than just their own overarching hierarchy of
control. They were allowed to become a ‘Buddhist’ mega church that has
now enfolded the other Buddhist streams into their net of influence
because of other Buddhist groups, like Zen and Theravada, and their own
greedy collusion with the mindfulness movement. A mega-billion
corporate movement ‘too big to fail’ simply because of the egregious
abuses of its
founder, Chogyam Trungpa.
The much bigger question is not about this CAT story of the author,
but why the very well-documented, sexual grooming of young girls,
sexual abuse of women and illegal harem keeping of women, in not one,
but two of the major Tibetan ‘Buddhist’ centers, Lama Sogyal of Rigpa,
and now Trungpa’s group, Shambhala/ Vajradhatu, have been allowed off
the hook and then off the radar again and again, while the Catholic
Church is being destroyed. Granted, their own sexual abuses are
abhorrent, but not written into and justified by the Vajrayana Tantric
Teachings themselves. And, the Catholics are demanding criminal
action.
Why are Lamaist and Hindu guru groups of Tantric Vajrayana, the new
replacement falsely-named ‘secular religion’ for Judaeo-Christianity,
being allowed to handle their ‘institutionalized’ abuse in-house,
AGAIN. That is the question uppermost in my mind these days."
Link to Christine Chandlers Blog:
https://extibetanbuddhist.com/sex-lies-and-abuse-in-shambhala/
The Buddhist Project Sunshine Phase 3 Final Report:
http://andreamwinn.com/project_sunshine/Buddhist_Project_Sunshine_Phase_3_Final_Report.pdf
In addition, here is a recent email we've received from the Expose we published about Shambhala:
"I was deeply disturbed to read the account from one of Chogynam Trungpa Rinpoche's wives about animal cruelty. In the same post (May 7, 2018), it is stated: "In addition, we have included another personal account of explicit animal abuse committed by Rinpoche
written by John Riley Perks in his book, The Mahāsiddha and His Idiot Servant." Unfortunately, the resolution of the photo is too poor to read the text and the book appears to be long out of print. Do you know where I could find a higher-resolution image or
a text excerpt of the passage? I had been planning on joining the Shambhala community and attending some retreats until the recent abuse allegations broke, and now I feel like I may have dodged a bullet. It seems like a lot of people are trying to say that
the current abuse committed by the Sakyong is not indicative of the values of the organization, but the more I read, the worse it gets. Any additional information would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks,
XXXX
We replied with further reading materials and evidence for this person and her response was:
"Thanks so much for the documents. I think it's fair to say that I will not be getting involved with Shambhala.
I was introduced to them through Pema Chodron's books (my therapist recommended them; I hear Oprah is also a fan). I had some doubts about CTR's "crazy wisdom" methods, but it seems like everyone, including Chodron, continue
to be apologists for his behavior, even 30+ years later. I thought that I could overlook the alcoholism and cocaine use and bigamy by viewing him as a deeply troubled human being (aren't we all, to an extent) but still a great teacher with deep wisdom, but
now he looks more like a charlatan who surrounded himself with people who still believe to this day that they can't say a bad word about him without violating their samaya vows and being sent to vajra hell.
Thanks for the work that you do to make information available about these organizations. I naively thought that the Catholic church held the monopoly on clergy abuse. I am looking forward to reading the third installment
of the Project Sunshine report that is due out later this month.
Sincerely,
XXXX"
Thank you,
The FACT Team
