Lieberman and the former abbot of the Jokhang Monastery moments after removing the bandages from the surgery that restored his vision

He visited a Tibetan hospital in 1995 and began teaching eye surgery. That was the start of the Tibet Vision Project. At the time, the state of eye surgery in Tibet was appalling, he says. The technology available was minimal, and the whole set-up was at least 60 years behind American practices. Undaunted, he gathered new equipment for the Tibetans—including microscopes—and using sheep eyeballs procured in a local market began to teach the local surgeons how to do a cataract operation. By the end of the first trip, the local doctors had performed the first unassisted operation.

Lieberman says the aim from the beginning was to train Tibetan physicians so that they, in turn, could train others. The idea has worked out well. More than a dozen surgeons have been trained so far. One young physician, says Lieberman, is superb at her work, performing an intricate procedure without sutures, and training other Tibetan surgeons to carry on the work. The Tibet Vision Project, dependent on donations, supplies the equipment. The goal is to train enough Tibetan surgeons so they can do modern lens-implant cataract operations, completing the backlog and taking on enough new cases to eliminate all present cataract blindness by the year 2020. “If we had 100 surgeons, we could make a tremendous difference,” he says.

“We do hundreds and hundreds of surgeries a year,” says Lieberman, who now travels with two colleagues, David Heiden and Melvyn Bert, an ophthalmologist known to the Tibetans as “Dr. Yogi.” “What always moves me is how the Tibetan people have completely trusted us. I imagine at first they must have thought we had arrived by UFO. We abducted them into our operating rooms and coughed them out again with the ability to see.” The project also provides free ongoing eye care to indigent patients in Lhasa, to children at the city’s School for Blind Children, and to residents of the local leprosarium.

The unfortunate thing, says Lieberman, is that not everyone can be helped, including people who have traveled so far. “It’s sad to tell them that there’s nothing we can do for them. We are equipped only to do cataract surgery. At present we can’t help with other conditions.”

And yet, for many, the work of the eye team is nothing short of miraculous. “I am moved by the miracle of our modern world,” says Lieberman, “when we can restore vision in just a few minutes and make a patient’s life turn a new page. People can go back to a life they barely remember.”

“I feel so fortunate, so blessed that I can bring to convergence a strong Jewish background, commitment to social justice, and this exposure to Buddhism to work in the heartland of Tibet,” he says, “a land which has gone through its own tragedy of history”

For Lieberman, it’s the perfect place to volunteer his medical skills and practice all he’s learned through the years. “I’m just happy I’ve found a path where everything comes together.”

Looking into the eyes of the people he treats, says Lieberman, changing their lives, and touching their souls, is a rare privilege. Half a world away from his origins, out there in the harsh, beautiful landscape of Tibet, he has found his calling. “I am always moved by the generosity of the Tibetan people,” he says. “And the miracle of watching people see again never tires me.”