Tibetan monks to help celebrate Key West’s ‘Week of Peace’

The Key West Tibetan Festival, set for Jan. 8 to15, has no shortage of names, from the Sacred Art Tour 2017 to the city’s proclamation that it’s the “Week of Peace.”

For Key West locals, it’s when the monks visit.

A group of ordained Tibetan monks from the Drepung Gomang Monastery in India will call Key West home for the week, hosting events that include meditations, a concert, a film festival, a bookstore talk and on-site blessings of places such as Bayshore Manor and the Florida Keys SPCA.

“There are many opportunities to be present and experience their ancient cultural teachings, artistic expressions and unique vocal chants with sacred instruments,” said Maria Protopsaltis, a board member of Key West Tara Mandala, which is sponsoring the event.

Except for a day trip to Stock Island, the monks’ activities will take place in Key West.

The monks are students of the Dalai Lama and the festival is a chance to hear them speak, sing, pray and teach, according to the Tibetan Buddhist Sangha led by Ellen Booth Church

Many of the events are free but donations are welcome, say organizers, who welcome all to come see the monks. They will spend all week building a sand mandala — a delicate yet intricate design of colored sands believed by Tibetan Buddhists to bring healing.

Like their 2016 visit, the monks will work on the sand mandala daily at St. Paul’s Episcopal Church, 401 Duval St., where people may visit to watch its construction, only to destroy the work in a ceremony at the ocean.

Key West city commissioners proclaimed the event a “Week of Peace,” noting that in Tibetan Buddhism, the conch shell — a symbol of the island — is used to call together religious assemblies.

This story was originally published January 4, 2017 at 9:28 AM with the headline "Tibetan monks to help celebrate Key West’s ‘Week of Peace’."