The garden's center is for ceremonial gatherings, and has been used as a venue for mass or individual prayer, speeches, musical performances, and shared spiritual practices with the local Salish-Kootenai people. A 2011 interview quoted tribal officials as grateful for the open and nondenominational nature of the garden, a welcome difference from other immigrant cultures which have been allowed to purchase tribal land because of a 1910 act that permits non-tribal settlement. Certain similar beliefs, and a shared history of persecution in their native lands have been described as uniting factors between the Buddhists and people of the Confederated Salish Kootenai Tribes. Sang-ngag himself was imprisoned during the Chinese Invasion of Tibet for ten years.