Lama Zopa Rinpoche's Very Special Food Offering
Every day since 1991 the Sera Je Food Fund initiated by Lama Zopa Rinpoche has been offering meals to more than 2,500 monks. By providing healthy and filling meals free of charge, this fund frees the monks from spending time in sourcing and preparing food so that they can concentrate on their studies, thereby becoming qualified teachers of the Buddha-Dharma. In this way, they make a very real and effective contribution to world peace.
Making offerings to the Sangha is a way of collecting unbelievable merit because all the sangha are the pores of the guru. They are all disciples of the same guru – His Holiness the Dalai Lama. By offering to the pores of the guru, you collect more merit than offering to the Buddha, Dharma, Sangha, as well as to numberless statues, stupas, and scriptures. If you offer with the recognition that they are the guru’s pores, that is an unbelievable way to collect merit. When you offer to many Sangha who have the same guru, you are making offerings to that many pores of the guru. So this is the easiest way to collect skies of merit by offering. By offering even just one candy, a flower, or even one grain of rice to a statue of Buddha, or even to a visualised buddha, you collect skies of merit, but here the offering is much more powerful than offering to the Three Jewels (Buddha, Dharma, Sangha), as well as to all the statues, stupas, and scriptures existing in all directions. There is no question of the merit you collect if you offer to disciples of the same guru. These benefits should be understood so that when you make offerings to the guru’s pores you think correctly. This is the best business.” (Lama Zopa Rinpoche)
Watch a short film about this fund:
Read more information about the fund.