Dr. Sulekh Chand Jain
Many prominent leaders of the Jain community across USA and Canada came to Las Vegas from October 14-19, 2016 for a retreat. The participants came from Boston, New Jersey, Philadelphia, Cincinnati, Houston, Los Angeles, Laguna Beach, Iowa City, Iowa, Denver, Edmonton, Alberta, Canada, and Norway. Most of the participants are renowned for their visionary leadership, dedication and philanthropy. The list of participants included Past President of Federation of Jain Associations in North America (JAINA), founders of Jain Centers in Boston, Los Angeles, New Jersey, Houston, Toledo (Ohio), Chicago and Albany, NY, donors to establish Chairs for Jain Studies at University of California Irvine and other universities, singer, retired Professor, researcher, artist and authors.
The purpose of this retreat was to mix, mingle establish relationship with local fellow Jains and non-Jains, relax, have fun, share and learn from each other. Jain SANGH of Las Vegas with a great enthusiasm welcomed all the guests and hosted them during the entire period.
The program included, Meet and Greet, Singing bhajans, Lectures on Scientific Basis of Jain Karma theory, Status and Progress of Jain Academic Education in North America and visit to local attractions etc. such as Valley of Fire, Red Rock Canyon and a Cruise on Lake Mead. Several Las Vegas Jain families hosted the guests to lavish dinner receptions at their homes and at the Hindu Jain temple during the retreat.
Shalin shah, a young and dedicated Animal Rights activist specially flew from Denver to talk about his Jeev Daya initiative to establish an animal sanctuary for sick and injured animals on a 40 acre land near Denver. Mauyri Bhandari, a graduate student in Jain and Hindu yoga Studies at Loyola Marymount University shared her experiences of the International School of Jain Studies (www.isjs.in) in India and performed a beautiful dance for the delight of all. All the meals were pure Jain vegetarian or Jain vegan.
All the delegates shared their wisdom, contributions and vision for promoting Jainism in their respective cities and nationally in USA and Canada. This retreat resulted in several key action items to take the objectives of this group to the next level. The Jain Sangh of Las Vegas and the delegates learnt a lot from the experiences, work and vision to promote Jain principles, practices and Jain Way of Life among younger generations of Jains and to develop a plan to reach out to them and others.
This first time ever retreat was a great success. All the delegates were very appreciative of the Las Vegas Jain Sangh and thanked them for the efforts and hospitality showed to them.