The Future

[Josef]

How can there ever be many people practising Dharma? Its aim denies a self while human instinct has always been working for the survival of self or at least its own kind. Moreover, it is a fact that the entire basis of Dharma has little or no evidence. It is just a belief system that people has the freedom of choice to take or not take up. Although it won't solve all the "problem", I think buddhist institutions should consider more deeply the required effort to convince more people the truth of some of its beliefs, at least. at least you get more believers to start with.

Evangelism is fundamentally opposed to dharma.
The idea of recruiting more "believers" or followers puts one on the path of the 8 worldly concerns and will only lead to the propagation of the hollow practice of identifying as Buddhist because one likes the idea of Buddhism. This is what we see a great deal of, in America we have a lot of people who call themselves Buddhists but they are a far cry from being Dharma practitioners.
Being humble and actually cultivating the qualities that our commitments and teachers intend is far more valuable than evangelism.
By becoming examples of the power of the teachings we benefit beings and inspire them to cultivate those qualities in themselves.

If telling people rebirth is real is evangelism, then how do we propagate Dharma?

If making more believers necessarily put one on the path of the 8 worldly concerns, then how do you propagate Dharma? How does one even start practicing if he doesn't even believe some of the basic tenets. I think your concern is one of the possible outcome but not necessarily the case.

My post addresses all of those questions.

[sillyrabbit]

@sillyrabbit I think the same. And I feel confirmed with what I hear in DJKR's speeches (you may find him controversial or not, but as it comes to cultural affliction he expresses self-reflectedness what is to be seen rarely with Tibetan lamas)

In Mexico a lecture participant had an issue with "too much bliss" or something and DJKR responded (in the line, no direct quote here) ' you need to apply a habanero. Something that stirs you up. Stirring up, that is the job of the guru.' Now why did he use the habanero in the response: because the guy needs to find an antidote compatible with his culture.

It is our job to find ways to get deeper into and apply Dharma in accordance with our cultural background. Not as a concept but on the ground, in the moment.
But maybe then also as a concept: maybe there'll be a western terma revealer finding mantra with (English sounding) syllables or a deity addressing the western issues?

Yes, DJKR's talks are great. The one you're referring to is in my queue. In another talk, he mentioned how he had a hard time getting some of his American students in California to recite in English. He really inspires me to examine my motives.

I think the present deities address western issues since they are not really different from any other issues (like clinging). It's not as if people my age don't know about it. One twitter account had a sexualized Tara image as a profile pic (NOT a "Buddhist geek" account by any means), and I had a tweet about "tantric BDSM" show up in my feed before (and was retweeted 10,000+ times). The deities are finding their way into people's mindstreams. They're not the problem.