Khensur Lungri Namgyel
Trisur Rinpoche Jetsun Lungrik Namgyal, also known as Khensur Lungri Namgyel, was born in 1927 in Kham (eastern Tibet) is the 101st Ganden Tripa, the leader of the Gelug sect of Tibetan Buddhism.
Ordained at eight years old, Venerable Rinpoche Lungrik Namgyal acquired the title of Geshe Lharampa (Ph.D) and Geshe Ngarampa (specialist in tantra) after forty years of intensive study and practice in all fields of Buddhist sutra and tantra including: The Five Major Treaties of Buddhist Philosophy and as well as extraordinary monastic education which also includes numerous sacred rituals.
After fifty years of meditative practices and studies he was elevated by Tenzin Gyatso the Dalai Lama as successively abbot of Gyutö Tantric College (in 1983), and as abbot of Ganden Shartse Monastic University (in 1992).
In 1986 he was the special envoy of the Dalai Lama to the interfaith meetings of Assisi in Italy convened by Pope John Paul II.
On January 20, 2003 His Holiness the Dalai Lama announced in Bodhgaya at the conclusion of the Kalachakra empowerment the appointment of Khensur Lungri Namgyel Rinpoche as the 101st Ganden Tripa. The Ganden Tripa position is the highest of the Gelug lineage. Its recipient is the supreme spiritual head of the Gelug school founded in Tibet in the 15th century by the great yogi-scholar and saint Je Tsongkhapa.
He is a French national and has been living in Paris, France for more than 20 years. He transmits the Buddhist teachings of his lineage in a Dharma Center, Thar Deu Ling which he founded in 1980.
