Tag: Religion and Belief

Here’s What to Know About Tensions Over Tibetan Buddhism

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Tibetan Buddhism has long been led by the Dalai Lama, the 88-year-old spiritual leader who fled Tibet in 1959 and has been living in exile in India ever since. Beijing considers the Dalai Lama a separatist and asserts that only the ruling Communist Party — an avowed atheist organization — can name his next incarnation and those of other high lamas. By seeking to control the religion’s leadership, China hopes it can all but erase the Dalai Lama’s influence in Tibet and any challenges to the party’s rule. As the…

Pope Visits Mongolia, With an Eye on Russia and China

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Pope Francis has long expressed a desire to visit Russia and China in hopes of healing the church’s historical rifts and ensuring the faith’s future in the populous East. On Friday, he came very close, landing in Mongolia, a country sandwiched between the two geopolitical giants, with a minuscule Catholic population that no pope has visited before. “The inhabitants are few,” Francis acknowledged in brief remarks on the plane to Mongolia, but he said the country that at times seemed so vast as not to end was also a place…

China’s Crackdown on Mosque Domes is Drawing Rare Resistance

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Walking through Nagu, a small town in the mountains of southwestern China, the signs of a vibrant Muslim community are ubiquitous. Loudspeakers broadcast passages from a Chinese translation of the Quran. Women in head scarves shuttle rowdy children home from school. Arabic script decorates the outside of homes. Towering over it all is the Najiaying Mosque, a white building topped with an emerald dome and four minarets that reach 230 feet into the air. For decades, the mosque has been the pride of the Muslim Hui ethnic minority that lives…

Master Hsing Yun, Monk Who Spread Buddhism in China, Dies at 95

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The Venerable Master Hsing Yun, a Buddhist monk who built a global network of temples that extended to mainland China, putting him at the vanguard of popularizing Buddhism in a country whose government had long been hostile to religion, died on Feb. 5 in Kaohsiung, Taiwan. He was 95. His death, at the Fo Guang Shan Monastery, was announced by his organization, Fo Guang Shan. No cause was given. Master Hsing Yun was criticized for his political ties, especially for his support of China’s authoritarian leader, President Xi Jinping. But…