By Tenzin Dharpo
DHARAMSHALA, Feb. 25: The Tibetan leader His Holiness the Dalai Lama topped the 2016 list of the 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People, published by Watkins’ Mind, Body and Spirit magazine for the fifth time. The head of the Catholic Church Pope Francis and Dalai Lama’s close friend Arch Bishop Desmond Tutu followed as the second and third.
The 81 year old has consecutively topped the magazine’s poll since 2012 and for the fifth time in a row.
The prestigious list has new inclusions in the 2016 edition including the Archbishop of Canterbury Justin Welby, psychologist and author Daniel Goleman, physicist and environmental activist Vandana Shiva and poet and philosopher Mark Nepo.
“We are delighted to share with you Watkins’ 2016 list of the 100 Most Spiritually Influential Living People – spiritual teachers, activists, authors and thinkers that change the world,” mentions the magazine that formally introduced the list back in 2011.
Other well known personalities that made the top ten are German spiritual teacher and writer Eckhart Tolle (fourth), Indian American author and public speaker Deepak Chopra (fifth), Brazilian novelist and author of The Alchemist Paulo Coelho (sixth), American novelist, short story writer, poet, and activist Alice Malsenior Walker (Seventh), Australian television writer and producer Rhonda Byrne (eighth), Chilean filmmaker and director of El Topo Alejandro Jodorowsky (Ninth) and American talk show host Oprah Winfrey (tenth).
