Western Funerals and Buddhist prayers

Earlier this week my monastery got a call from someone who’s mother had past away and they wanted a monk to says some prayers at the funeral.  The mother was a Buddhist sympathizer and had recently been to Burma to participate in the protests there.

I was asked by to attend and to chant the Je Tsong Khapa Lamrim prayer and two dedication prayer written by Geshe Loden.
I often have fun at these events because people are more open at these times and you can get all types of people asking all sorts of questions. So it is a good chance to smooth out some of the misconceptions that the average Joe or Mary has about Dharma and boy there are some strange ideas about what Buddhism is!

I was asked back to the wake which was just around the corner and so of course I went. The afternoon was nice and I spent most of the 3 hours fielding questions ranging from what is meditation to how does Buddhism explain evolution! 

During the actual funeral ceremony when it came time for the Buddhist part. I started by given a small introduction into Buddhism as the Lamrim prayer would be quite difficult for people to understand that have had no exposure to Dharma.
Then I recited the prayer and went back and sat back down. Later on I thought to ask Geshe-la about this as perhaps the prayer was not the best one to recite. So, when I got back home I went straight up to Geshe-la room, knocked on the door (3 times) and entered quietly. Geshe-la looked at me smile and said come in sit, sit, there, there, you sit there. I explained to him about the events of the day and then I remembered I had to ask about the Lamrim prayer. I was going to ask whether the prayer was a little too difficult for non Buddhists but, I didn’t even get the sentence fully out…maybe the first 2 or 3 words when Geshe-la interjected saying this prayer much power! So that was that the prayer stays

I guess it’s a karmic thing that leaves an deep imprint in the hearers mind!

As I walked out of Geshe-la room I thought WOW I am so lucky to be here.

The Tibetan Book of Living and Dying