1. Michael Roach was born on December 17,1952 and is an American businessman, spiritual leader, and former Buddhist monk by the name Geshe Lobsang Chunzin, and scholar who has started a number of businesses and organizations, written books inspired by Buddhism, and translated Tibetan Buddhist teachings.
Michael Roach has at times been the center of controversy for his views, teachings, activities, and behavior.
Michael Roach was born on 17 December 1952 in Los Angeles, California to traditional Episcopalian parents.
Michael Roach grew up in Phoenix, Arizona along with three brothers.
Michael Roach traveled to India in 1973 to seek Buddhist instruction, while still in college.
Michael Roach returned to the United States and received a scholarship to return to study in India in 1974.
Michael Roach returned to Princeton, living at the monastery from 1975 to 1981.
From 1993 to 1999, Michael Roach developed and taught 18 courses on Tibetan Buddhism in New York City.
From 2000 to 2003, Michael Roach organized and led a three-year silent retreat in the Arizona desert with five other participants, including Christie McNally with whom Michael Roach had a relationship and shared a room with during this time.
In 2004, Michael Roach established Diamond Mountain Center, a retreat center in Arizona.
In 1981, Khen Rinpoche, the teacher of Michael Roach, challenged him to apply Buddhist values to the "dirtiest business and make it clean".
Since then, Michael Roach has helped to found and develop the corporation Andin International, a jewelry manufacturer based in New York.
Michael Roach used the money from his work to create funds to finance various projects, such as food fund Sera Mey.
For seventeen years, and while studying Buddhism, Michael Roach commuted to a day job in Manhattan.
In 1999, the publishing house Doubleday Corporation, which is part of Penguin Random House, invited Michael Roach to write a book about the style of management he used for business and life.
In "The Diamond Cutter: The Buddha on Managing Your Business and Your Life", Michael Roach explains how to apply the lessons of the Sutra of the Diamond Cutter in the context of business.
In 1987, Michael Roach founded the Asian Classics Input Project.
Michael Roach founded this project in order to create a complete and accessible version of Kangyur and Tengyur in electronic form along with related philosophical commentaries and dictionaries.
Michael Roach used proceeds from his work to set up financial endowments to fund various projects, in particular the Sera Mey Food Fund.
When news of the marriage emerged in 2003, Michael Roach explained to the New York Times that they had wished to honor their Christian heritage and that he wanted McNally to be entitled to his possessions if something happened to him.
Michael Roach argued that the future of Buddhism in America relies on being more inclusive of and welcoming to women.
When Michael Roach proposed to teach in Dharamshala in 2006, the Office of the Dalai Lama rebuffed his plan, stating that Michael Roach's "unconventional behavior does not accord with His Holiness's teachings and practices"; the teaching took place in nearby Palampur instead.
Michael Roach then began to massage him from his head down to his penis before finishing with a kiss on the lips.
Michael Roach was part of a handful of Western Tibetan Buddhist teachers facing such allegations in the 2000s including Surya Das and Ken McLeod.
In 2010, one year after the dissolution of her marriage to Michael Roach, McNally married Thorson.
Michael Roach has fielded critiques of cult like behavior after his many controversies.
Michael Roach has been uninvited to teach at FPMT centers across the globe in addition to being publicly rebuked by the office of the Dalai Lama.