A FOND DREAM: GOING TO MECCA WITH THE POPE

The audacity of that dream still lingers. At an event in Oslo, soon after he received the Nobel Peace Prize, the Dalai Lama turned to me and whispered, “Wouldn't it be wonderful if the Pope, the Shankaracharya, a few others and I could travel together to Mecca and pray there for world peace?” It wasn’t for the cameras. It was a quiet longing, improbable, tender and heartfelt—a pilgrimage not to convert, but to honour sacred reverence.

- BY RAJIV MEHROTRA

The measure of that dream lies not in its fulfilment, but in how he embodies it.

He claims no mystical powers. He has no divine pretensions. Though revered by millions as the embodiment of Avalokiteshvara—the Buddha of compassion—he describes himself, with disarming humility, as “a Buddhist monk, nothing more”. His aspiration is not for elevation, but for a vow: to live as a Bodhisattva, one who returns, life after life, not to escape suffering, but to serve.

“For as long as space endures, and for as long as living beings remain, Until then, may I too abide, to dispel the misery of the world.”

This is not just a line of poetry for him—it is his daily prayer, drawn from Shantideva’s Bodhicharyāvatāra. A vow he renews each morning. It embodies the essence of his life's purpose: to return, again and again, not for liberation alone, but to serve all beings.

He believes the mind is as unique as a fingerprint. No single religion or method can serve all. Some minds are drawn to reason, while others are drawn to devotion or ritual. What matters is not uniformity, but inner transformation. That, he says, is the true purpose of faith.

His openness is not performance. It is practice.

In 2008, eminent surgeon Dr Pradeep Chowbey and his team prepared to remove hundreds of gallstones from the Dalai Lama’s gallbladder in a high-tech laparoscopic procedure. The operation theatre was calm, focused and clinical.

While we waited outside, prayer beads in hand, murmuring silent mantras, something inexplicable unfolded inside. Just as the surgery began, all the equipment suddenly shut down. Monitors went blank. Machines fell silent. For a few long seconds, the theatre was suspended in an eerie hush.

No technical fault. No power failure. Just complete stillness.