Making Friends with Death

Speaker: Venerable Bhikshuni Dr Karma Lekshe Tsomo (Joining online from Hawaii)

Wed 8 Nov | 7-8.30pm AEDT

Location: In person at Western Sydney University (74 Rickard Rd, Bankstown City Campus), Room 1.4.34 on level 4 or Online (CLICK HERE for Zoom link )

Cost: Free

Death is an inescapable reality for all human beings, but we generally try to avoid the topic. If we’re in denial, though, how will we deal with death when the time comes? If we shun the topic, how will we be able to help others deal with grief and loss? By making friends with death, we can learn to face our own fears and become compassionate caregivers for others at the end of life. By studying the Buddha’s advice on death and dying, we can not only prepare for a peaceful death, but also live a more meaningful life.

About the speaker: Venerable Bhikshuni Dr Karma Lekshe Tsomo is a Buddhist monastic and professor teaching at San Diego University. She began meditating in the Zen tradition in Japan in 1965, then studied with U.S.N. Goenka, H.H. Dalai Lama and other teachers in India from 1972. She received novice ordination in France in 1977 and full ordination in Korea in 1982. In 2000, she received a Ph.D. in Comparative Philosophy at the University of Hawai‘i Mānoa, where she is the 2023 Numata Professor of Buddhist Studies, and also serves as director of La’i Peace Center in Waialua, Hawai’i. Her publications include Women in Buddhist Traditions; Buddhist Feminisms and Femininities; and Into the Jaws of Yama: Buddhism, Bioethics, and Death.

In 1985 Karma Lekshe Tsomo founded the Jamyang Foundation, a non-profit organisation that works to improve the education of women and girls in the Himalayan region and currently runs several schools and study programmes in India and Bangladesh. At a gathering at Bodh Gaya in 1987 she became one of the founding members of the international organisation Sakydhita (Daughters of the Buddha), which campaigns for gender equality in Buddhism. She is currently working to create Lai’i Peace Center as a resource for peace education, Buddhist studies, and community service programs under the auspices of Sakyadhita Hawai’i. More info can be found here, on the San Diego University website, and on Wikipedia.

Hybrid event: Attend the session in person, or online by clicking on this link to access the session: https://us02web.zoom.us/j/83506489824?pwd=cmpNQ1ljSmFVYURLWVN1dWllYUN1dz09 Alternatively, you can dial in from your telephone (call charges apply): +61 2 8015 6011 | Meeting ID: 835 0648 9824| Passcode: 718905