[wooclosmercob]

An alternative is to pay for public talks and teachings out of general-purpose donations made to a foundation by supporters. Then the talks may be free to those who attend, but they are not free in any other sense

This may be the case for talks aimed at large sections of the general public which require hired venues - but at a Forest Tradition monastery, for example, all it takes is a large space where people who want to attend can sit down to listen to a talk given by a teacher - and ordained Theravadin monks don't charge for their services to others.......nor do they appear to be interested in PR and courting the media and celebrities.

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[SonicPs]

namaste ,

I am going to comment on this deliberately before reading the article , and going off everyones comments allone ,
I am old enough to have experienced all sides of this debate first hand , I remember earlier days when tibetan buddhism was not so universaly recognised , the teachings were then smaller and of course much cheaper to host , every thing was simpler , no need for huge venues and the enormous costs involved in staging such events , and simply relied on borrowing colledge halls and relying on voulentary helpers to handle the management , or in the case of organised retreat centers , just borrowing enough chairs for a larger ordience .
things have progressed a long way in my thirty years of practice , and with change comes the inevitable benifits and losses , now that buddhism has attracted a wider audience , the benifits I experienced of smaller more personal teachings with the advantage of much more affordable ticket prices (or simple , by donation) have become a thing of the past .

the next progression was for each independant group to think of opening their own centers and retreats , this meant fund raising , for me it meant that I either worked for my keep or paying for a ticket , but this was simply a fact of life , a cost of providing dharma in the west , making it more accessable to a wider section of the comunity .

now in my case I did have some reservations about how this was being accheived and ended up leaving the western tibetan system and spending morer time visiting other , systems , hugely preffering the temple system , but even these rely heavily on donations from the lay comunity , within the culturaly buddhist by birth comunitys , this works well with the wealthier of the comunity donating very large sums , allowing for the support of the remainder of the comunity , but this old system dosent work so well in the west , allthough personaly I prefer this system and beleive strongly that this is how it should idealy be , but I think that we all realise that things dont allways conform with the idealistic veiw .

I think the only conclusion to be drawn from this is that we should do all we can on a personal level to make dharma accessable ,
it is true that fault can be found in any system , but I am not sure that we will be best spending our time by dwelling too heavily on the rights and wrongs ,
but using our energies to do what we can to help support the systems we beleive in .

namskars ratikala

[JohnMitchel]

I remember earlier days when tibetan buddhism was not so universaly recognised , the teachings were then smaller and of course much cheaper to host ...
... in my case I did have some reservations about how this was being accheived and ended up leaving the western tibetan system

This very much mirrors my experience. Initially donations, people put in what they could afford, then fees, fees, fees. If you didn't have the cash, then hard luck.
I agree with Woodscooter regarding costs etc. but there is also the possibility of allowing for donations from wealthy patrons to offset costs incurred by those who cannot find the cash. There just needs to be the will for it and perhaps a bit less spent on grand glitzy stuff. Many Buddhist organisations are now run along corporate lines. A bit like the Christian monasteries before Henry Vlll asset-stripped them.