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The following email was sent to members of Shambhala Europe and other friends of Dechen Chöling as the second part of our end of year fundraising campaign 2019.
Dear Shambhala Friends,
I wrote to you in November to share with you a little bit about how Dechen Chöling has been doing financially and to let you know how you can be of help at this time.
That email marked the launching of our second ever End of Year Fundraising Campaign. We do not get a share of the Shambhala Day Fundraising anymore, so this is our primary chance to receive support from the community.
I also would like to let you know that Dechen Chöling is exploring the possibility of hosting the Rigden Abhisheka led by Sakyong Mipham Rinpoche next summer. A significant number of students are longing to continue their practice path and have supplicated the Sakyong to offer them the Rigden Abhisheka and we have been exploring ways to support these students. At this time, there is no confirmation that this will take place and we will let the community know whether or not this gathering will go forward.
For those of you who continue to feel a connection to Dechen Chöling and what we offer, I am again asking for your financial support to allow us to keep our doors open for retreats and be a place of refuge for anyone wanting to connect with their basic sanity and goodness.
As reported in my previous communication, there has been an approximately 30% shortfall in revenue due to low programme registrations in 2019. We responded by pushing planned improvement projects to a later point in time, cutting expenses in general and making the decision to significantly reduce staff numbers. Due to these actions, our operating shortfall for 2019 is 150.000 EUR, which is significant, but also much lower and more manageable than initially expected.
As such, it is our goal to raise 150.000 EUR with our End of Year Fundraising Campaign.
This will allow us to cover our operating shortfall in 2019 and enter 2020 healthy and strong.
Again, it is important to know that Dechen Chöling will not be a part of Shambhala Day fundraising in Europe anymore. Instead, Dechen Chöling is shifting to a rhythm of end of year fundraising campaigns going forward. This is in line with how all of the other land centres in Shambhala conduct their fundraising and provides more clarity, as donors will know their donation will go directly to Dechen Chöling. This approach also increases the possibility of raising funds from donors outside of Europe. The previous strategy of annual fundraising meant that Dechen Chöling would receive a share of the Shambhala Day funds raised in Europe only.
If you would like to support us now, you can click here to donate.
While generous one-time gifts are very important to help us meet this ambitious goal, monthly donations of any amount are also extremely helpful, as they constitute reliable and stable income that we can count on every month. To set up a recurring monthly donation please contact Adrian Bude at financeassistant@dechencholing.org.
I am including our financial figures for this year once again. You can click here to view a spreadsheet with those figures.
We are working very hard to find stable financial ground in the midst of the ongoing challenging times for Shambhala. Please click here to read more about the steps we have taken facing our current financial situation.
As previously mentioned as well, looking ahead at how Dechen Chöling will be able to function in the coming years, we are in need of people coming here, offering their help in our various departments, either as a voluntary neighbour or as part of our Meditation in Action programme. This is a wonderful way to support Dechen Chöling and its team. If you are interested, please do not hesitate to get in touch.
Thank you once again for your ongoing support!
With much warmth and appreciation,
Konstanze Brockstedt, Dechen Chöling Director
With the support of:
Veronika Bauer, Managing Director for Shambhala Europe
Faradee Rudy, Development Director for Shambhala
Full information about the different ways to make donations, via cheques, transfers or online, and information about receiving tax-receipts for donations made in France, Netherlands and Germany can be found here.
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