Spiritual Advisers

The Garrison Institute is blessed to have the guidance of three cherished spiritual advisers.

Father Thomas Keating

Father Thomas Keating was born in New York City in 1923 and entered the Cistercian Order in Valley Falls, Rhode Island, in 1944. He was appointed Superior of St. Benedict's Monastery, Snowmass, Colorado, in 1958 and was elected Abbot of St. Joseph's Abbey, Spencer, Massachusetts, in 1961. He returned to Snowmass after retiring as Abbot of Spencer...

Gelek Rimpoche

Born in Lhasa, Tibet, in 1939, Kyabje Gelek Rimpoche was recognized as an incarnate lama at the age of four. Carefully tutored by some of Tibet's greatest living masters, Rimpoche gained renown for his powers of memory, intellectual judgment and penetrating insight. He is among the last generation of lamas educated in Drepung Monastery...

Zalman Schachter-Shalomi

Zalman Schachter-Shalomi, better known as 'Reb Zalman,' was born in Zholkiew, Poland, in 1924. Raised largely in Vienna, his family was forced to flee the Nazi oppression in 1938. After almost three years without roots, they finally landed in New York City in 1941, settling in Brooklyn, where young Zalman enrolled in the yeshiva of the Lubavitcher Hasidim...