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Friday, Sept. 20 • TheFranklinNews.com
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By Caitlin Soard
caitlin.soard@franklincollege.edu
Megan Banta: The Franklin
The monks work to construct a sacred sand mandala.
Students had a chance to experience Eastern culture this past week through several events on campus. A group of monks from the Tashi Kyil monastery in Tibet arrived on campus last Friday. Monks from the same monastery visited the college in the fall of 2011 to spend a week creating a sand mandala, which they left as a gift for the college. They returned this year to create another mandala. The mandala this year had a theme of compassion, as opposed to the previous mandala, which focused on peace. David Weatherspoon, campus minister, said it was unusual for the monks to preserve the mandala that they created on campus two years ago. “They usually destroy the mandalas,” Weatherspoon said. “Last
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Monks return to campus, create mandala time was unique in that they presented it to us as a gift. That’s unusual; usually they take them (and destroy them) as a sign of impermanence; everything fades.” This year, the monks followed tradition by destroying the mandala and taking it to the creek behind the admissions center. The 2013 visit differed somewhat from the 2011 visit because the monks lived in lounges in Elsey Hall on the same floor as students. In 2011, they lived in the Andrews-Dietz House. The monks stayed on campus over a weekend this year and attended the football game against Butler University . WFCI hosted a radio program with the group of monks on Monday afternoon, and there was a Tibetan See “Monks” on Page 10