Video: Refuge in the Storm Webinar Series, Part I: Buddhist Approaches to Large-Scale and Community Crises

This webinar is the first in a series offered by the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School. It featured a panel discussion of contributors to part I of Refuge in the Storm: Buddhist Voices in Crisis Care, edited by Nathan Jishin Michon. The panel included Dr. Victor Gabriel, Chun Fai (Jeffrey) Ng, and Dr. g (Claudelle R. Glasgow, Psy.D., SEP, and will be co-moderated by Rev. Dr. Nathan Jishin Michon and Rev. Dr. Monica Sanford.

This event took place on September 20, 2023.

Full transcript:

SPEAKER 1: Harvard Divinity School. Refuge in the Storm Webinar Series Part One: Buddhist Approaches to Large-Scale and Community Crises, September 20th 2023.

MONICA SANFORD: Welcome, everyone. I'm Monica Sanford. I am the Assistant Dean for Multi-religious Ministry at Harvard Divinity School which is located in Cambridge, Massachusetts on the ancestral land of the Massachusetts people. I am here today with the wonderful editor and co-authors of this fantastic book, Refuge in the Storm: Buddhist Voices in Crisis Care, edited by Nathan Jishin Michon, sorry. It's kind of a tongue twister, Nathan. Nathan Jishin Michon.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Nishin.

MONICA SANFORD: Nishin. Nishin Michon, thank you. So, Dr. Michon is the JSPS, which means, what, Japan--

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Japan Society for the Promotion of Science. Nihon Gakujutsu Shinkokai.

MONICA SANFORD: The Japan Society for the Promotion of Science visiting scholar focused on Buddhist chaplaincy at Ryukoku University in Kyoto, Japan. Dr. Michon is the editor of Refuge in the Storm: Buddhist Voices in Crisis Care as well as this other wonderful book, A Thousand Hands: Guidebook to Caring for your Buddhist Community, which you can see I use a lot, based on the number of little sticky notes that I have added to it, amongst other works.

Dr. Michon especially focuses their research on Japanese Buddhist chaplaincy, chaplain training, and contemplative forms of care. They previously helped in disaster relief and hospice care. Dr. Michon is also a graduate of the Institute of Buddhist Studies, which is part of the Graduate Theological Union in Berkeley, California and the University of the West, which is where I was delighted to have him as a classmate for several years. So welcome, Dr. Michon.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you.

MONICA SANFORD: So I want to start out by asking you a question about your chapter in this book. And then I want to let you introduce your authors and give them time to talk about their chapters. But just very briefly, the book is divided into four sections, and so we're hoping that we can host actually four-- at least three, but maybe four-- webinars as part of this series. The first section is on Buddhist approaches to large-scale and community crisis, and it has eight chapters. And we're delighted to have three of the chapter authors with us here today. So thank you so much for joining us, our wonderful authors.

But I wonder, Nathan, if you might just tell us a little bit, you've got the large-scale and community crisis. Part 2 is about sickness, aging, and death, caring for life cycle crises. Part 3 is about caring for crisis workers, Buddhist approaches to stress management and self-care, and then Part 4 is about becoming a Buddhist care worker, training programs, and Buddhist education. Could you give us an idea of how these parts break down and what part one, which is the large-scale and community crisis care that we're going to focus on tonight, basically encompasses?

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Sure. So, first, I should also mention, a lot of the chapters in the book could have fit in multiple sections or categories. Organizing, trying to figure out how to organize them all was a little bit of a challenge, but with consultation with a number of others. I also saw Hyun Shin on the call. So thank you to her help as well in some of that process, and the publishers as well.

But this first section, again, the large-scale community level crisis covered chapters that focused more on, again, these bigger types of crises that happen in society, often, when we're more likely to hear the word crisis. So, for example, large environmental destruction and disasters, and then different community and society level type crises as well. For example, like issues of racism, gender discrimination, and looking down here now again, but larger-scale community crises as well. And we have Jeffrey on the call today, too, who will talk about some of the protests and issues that were going on in Hong Kong in recent years, and so these larger conflicts that can happen as well.

Whereas the second section goes more into-- a little more into the personal side of focus, with these life cycle crises. Just briefly, then, the third section, as Monica introduced the title for caring for crisis workers, but that also gets into the issue of when people are full-time or for longer periods, especially, on a regular basis caring for others, caring for others, always opening their hearts up. Care workers, care volunteers also need care themselves. And how do we provide that level of care, but also, issues of self-care and self-preservation for that kind of work.

And then again, finally, the last section, a smaller section but focused a little more on the type of training that people could go through if, for example, either if you're reading some of this and interested in getting more involved, what kind of training might you go through to get into a field like this. But also some stories from Japan and China and different parts of the world of what people in different societies go through to try to develop training for people in these types of fields.

MONICA SANFORD: Yeah. Because chaplaincy training looks quite different all around the world. And then there's also disaster care relief and volunteer training and lots of different ways to get involved in this.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Yeah.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you. So I want to let our audience know that you can add questions in the Q&A, which, if you look down at your little bar at the bottom of your webinar, you see Q&A. You can put questions in there at any time. We'll be curating them, and we're going to ask most questions towards the end of the webinar. But if it's something simple that can just be answered with a text response, we'll try to get to it as quickly as we can. But go ahead and put your questions in the Q&A at any point in time.

So Nathan, you start us out in this book with your wonderful introduction. And I wanted to ask you just about one thing that's in your introduction. There's a lot here. I really appreciated the Buddhist disaster and crisis care approach with these I think it's 12 practices, like these 12 principles, especially for disaster care but for all forms of crisis care. They're so pragmatic. I really appreciate that. But what I actually want to ask you about is kind of a very particular thing that I think Buddhism contributes to this conversation on disaster and crisis care, which, in your chapter, you make this distinction between the English language term compassion, and how that is understood in English-speaking societies, and the Buddhist term karuna, and I'm using the Pali here, I believe it's the same in Pali and Sanskrit, karuna which is most frequently translated into English as compassion, but is slightly different from the English language meaning of the term.

So can you walk us through that, what the difference is, and then what the Buddhist term in particular could contribute to our ability to respond to these kinds of crises.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Sure. So, yeah, thank you very much for that introduction. And I'll briefly say at the beginning, too, I think this partly became an important issue for me, especially related to that third section of the book that I was talking about, with care for crisis workers and anyone in these care disciplines, because previously, I was a little more in peace and conflict studies and interning with people from the UN and different conflict zones who were coming into our non-profit organization, non-government organization, from all these places and listening to the stress, the deep stress, that people held, and then moving into chaplaincy as well, hearing some of the issues that people come up with as such regular care providers.

And then seeing sometimes shortly after going through all the training or not long thereafterwards, even just people dropping out because they loved that job but just couldn't handle that constant taking on of other people's stresses and suffering. So, I think it led me to often think about what really is compassion and how can we work with that. And so, as Monica mentioned, the English word compassion, it comes from these Latin roots that more literally mean to suffer with. And as a Buddhist, and especially even going through chaplaincy programs and sometimes hearing this among other chaplains, oh, be compassionate, hold compassion, and suffer with. And I'm thinking as a Buddhist, well, our general point of our Buddhist practice is to overcome suffering, right? So, how am I supposed to be compassionate?

And so I think this led me to explore those issues a lot. But I might just pull up one little quote here from Analayo Bhikkho about that compassion. And so he says in talking about karuna, "Drawing a clear distinction between the realization that others are suffering and the wish for them to be free from suffering is important, since mentally dwelling on the actual suffering would be contemplation of dukkha, i.e. suffering itself. In this way, the mind takes the vision of freedom from affliction as its object. Such an object can generate a positive, at times even joyful state of mind, instead of resulting in sadness. Thus compassion does not mean to commiserate to the extent of suffering along with the other."

So he makes this clear distinction of the focus on more-- the hope and the positive change and things like this and keeping that in mind, rather than the focus being on the suffering itself, I think can also-- I had felt intuitively that this might be a more healthy form of compassion, not just for me but maybe for others as well. But then I started reading more and more into psychological studies on compassion as well, and there were more and more interesting studies along this way to at least begin to confirm some of those suspicions and thoughts, and that there are actually many forms of compassion.

And so, I won't go into too much of the details here, but one researcher I talk about is Jamil Zaki and how he distinguishes these different types of compassion, and in a similar way, talks about this compassion that reflects other's suffering versus compassion that is filled with hope for suffering to leave. And in his studies, how much there was a desperate tendency for nurses in particular to burn out if they particularly focused on this first type of compassion, versus the resilience and longevity and general happiness of the nurses who focused on this latter form of compassion.

And I think just briefly, in Buddhism, we have so many distinctions of different types of compassion, different forms of Guanyin, Kannon, Avalokiteshvara, this being of the embodiment of compassion and what all of these different forms of Guanyin mean. I think, we maybe have a lot to contribute to further exploration of what these different forms of compassion can mean for care.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you so much, Nathan. This is something that I have also seen in my research with Buddhist chaplains, not necessarily working in large-scale disasters, but in all of the places where chaplains work, is this distinction between compassion that can actually bring about a kind of joy, and we're seeing that now in some of the psychological literature, that there is a kind of compassion that brings a level of joy and satisfaction with it, versus compassion that is really more rooted in empathic distress, in feeling the other person's suffering to the point where your actions become rooted more in relieving that distress for the sake of your own distress, rather than necessarily for the sake of the person who's experiencing the suffering.

So I really appreciate that you make that distinction and that it's actually showing up not only in the Buddhist literature, but also in the psychological studies of compassion that are now emerging. So I want to end there on your chapter. We could talk about your chapter for the whole hour, we could talk about all of our authors' chapters for the whole hour, but I'm going to disappear and just watch the Q&A for these juicy questions which are already coming in. But Nathan, would you please introduce your three authors? And then I know you're going to have a conversation with each of them in turn.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Yes. Thank you. And so I am really delighted and honored to be with these three people here today, all very special and having done great work in their own right. So, first, we have, kind of going down my own screen here, we have Victor Gabriel. Besides being a long and dear friend, he is also the Chair and Assistant Professor now at the Department of Buddhist Chaplaincy at University of the West, and he is the Program Coordinator for the Master of Divinity in Buddhist Chaplaincy.

And we have Dr. G, who is PsyD, SEP, and NEDA-proficient, and a healing artist, writer, and public speaker. Doc supports intersectional BIPOC towards their unapologetic authentic selves by thorough working with intergenerational and ancestral traumas through body, mind, and spirit. Doc does a lot of wonderful counseling work and speaking as well.

And then Jeffrey Ng is a graduate of the Master of Buddhist Counseling program at the Center for Buddhist Studies from the University of Hong Kong and a certified mindfulness teacher with the Search Inside Yourself Leadership Institute. And again, it's a pleasure to have all three of you here today with us. So, if you don't mind, we'll start today going with Victor in that order.

VICTOR GABRIEL: Thank you, Nathan, and thank you, Monica. It's been such a pleasure working with you on these books. I enjoy the collaboration, and I enjoy the collegialship and the continued friendship over these years. I'm going to share with you some PowerPoint slides. They relate to the chapter, they may touch upon the topics already mentioned that I wrote about, and also, they springboard to other thoughts or other ideas that I did not have a chance to address in that chapter. I'm going to share my screen.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: And just to briefly mention while he's sharing his screen, his chapter is the Ecology of the Bodhisattva, so, especially related to environmental issues, environmental destruction, and the issues and care around that.

VICTOR GABRIEL: Thank you, Nathan. Nathan, if I go over, please tell me, OK? Don't let me go--

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: OK. Sure.

VICTOR GABRIEL: Second slide. So the scriptural sources for my chapter are the Jataka tales, the stories of the Buddha's previous birth, the Sutras, which, the environment, the natural environment, plays so much a background to the major events of the Buddha's life, right, saving the swan, the injured swan, the royal plowing ceremony where he has his first experience of calm-abiding samatha, the Deer Park where he turned the wheel of Dharma, and his death between two sala trees, for example. And also the lives of the many Buddhist saints in the various traditions, all surrounded by nature, in caves, in forests, in mountains.

And one of the main themes of my chapter is this idea of interbeing. This is a poem by Su Dongpo or Su Shi, it's called A Gift to his Zen Master. "The sounds of the valley streams are his long, broad tongue. The forms of the mountains are his pure body. All night I hear the myriad Sutra verses uttered. How can I relate to others what they say?"

So in this poem, quoted by-- in the West, this is very popular because this poem was quoted by Tobin and it refers to-- and he draws the streams as a metaphor for the ever-flowing Dharma, the mountains as the stability of the Dharma or the immutability of the Dharma, and that-- and they hide a secret, and that secret, once known, cannot be spoken, cannot be even explained, because it is so transcendent.

The major themes in this work of Buddhism and ecology: interconnectedness, interdependence, nonviolence, on the principle of not killing, not destroying, living creatures. So that is not stressed in my chapter; I didn't have time for that. The activity of the Bodhisattvas, and our world being the pure land of Buddha Shakyamuni. And one other theme that I wanted to push forward more but it would require more pages and more explanation is this idea of taking refuge. Nathan's book is called Refuge In The Storm. And I wanted to make a push that also we can take refuge in nature. And I'll see-- I'll develop that in this talk.

This other slide is about chaplaincy and ecology. And there are eco chaplains. And in their work, they talk about being nourished by nature, and being intentional in our interaction with nature, seeking justice and equity for nature, and then taking nature as a person, as a subject and not an object, and supporting activists, and defining activists as careseekers for social change, and seeing nature herself as a careseeker.

And finally, I would like you to-- I would like to invite you to do a little beginning anew meditation with me. This comes from the Thich Nhat Hahn community from Plum Village. There are four parts of beginning anew-- flower watering, expressing regret, expressing how we suffer, and to ask for support. And in the first stage, how does nature nourish us? The second, expressing your regrets-- and expressing how we suffer because of nature, and to ask support. So if we can lean back, so get into a comfortable position, close our eyes if that is needed, if you need to. And just generally place yourself into a meditative way.

Think back when was the last time you were in nature, how that natural environment nourished you. Then move to how we have abused nature-- how we have seen her as an object, something that we can exploit, abuse, and slave, how we have abused or exploited our plant brothers and sisters, our animal brothers and sisters, our mineral and nonhuman brothers and sisters. And also expressing how we also suffer because of climate change-- the loss of shoreline, the loss of predictable seasons, let your changes-- the dramatic changes.

And finally, to ask support. Yes, we can ask support from scientists, good scientific advice to do to change. But now at this moment, just allow your imagination or inspiration as you take refuge in nature. What would the ecology would like you to do? What kind of activism, ecological activism you can do better? Reducing electricity, reducing meat consumption, recycling. et cetera. What speaks to you? Allow nature to speak to you. Allow your imagination to speak to you without judgment. Thank you. Thank you, everyone.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you very much for that. I think it sets the stage beautifully for our conversation today. Is this a type of practice that you do often or integrate into your instruction as well for students?

VICTOR GABRIEL: I think it is something I did once with my student. And now, I'm sharing it. It's still very brand new.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: It was really beautiful. Thank you.

VICTOR GABRIEL: Thank you. Thank you for giving me this platform, Nathan.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: And with-- as we move ahead with Dr. G and Jeffrey, it'll be a little bit more of a conversational format, but listening to their stories and inspirations for their chapters. So next, we have Dr. G here with us. And Dr. G's chapter was Finding the Flow in Crisis within the book. And I communicated with Doc little before this and. Despite just six pages, there is so much in here. And Doc touches on so many issues. As Monica said, all of these chapters could easily be an hour of conversation in themselves, far more than that even. However,

Doc's chapter especially touches on issues of racism, white supremacy, BIPOC issues in society. And I want to give Doc first the opportunity because there is touching on so many of these issues. But also, Doc does a lot of work around these topics as well. And so would you mind? Of course, I fully understand you can't get into any specifics of issues with any of your clients and things like that. But more generally speaking, can you speak to the way in which these issues in your chapter connect to the work that you're doing in life and in your position?

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: Thank you, Nathan. And thank you, Victor. I just feel even more in my body. So I needed that. I needed that trip to the ocean is where I went in practice. And thank you, everyone, for being here. All these are just wonderful mistakes. I feel like that we happen upon these paths.

And-- and honestly, like, in the way with which I practice, you know, psychology-- I was trained in Western psychology. I have to acknowledge that. And I have to acknowledge that is innately racist and innately disorder-oriented, which is not with the way with which-- and the culture with which I come out of. So I recognize that that is a part of me. And I'm continually doing the work.

When I got into this field, I wanted to be an artist. And my parents and family were like, we did not come to this country for you to doodle and write. [CHORTLES] So the next-- for me, the next best thing was to do anything that had to do with the heart. And that's what I thought this field was about when I got into it. So for me, it's about being whole people.

And I'm, you know, one could say disadvantaged or one could say fortunate, to have chosen this body of being otherwise undesirable probably worldwide and unprotected worldwide, about being non-binary, still being in a female body, being Black, specific Black, but just generally Black, and therefore a currency for most of this world. And I find tremendous joy in it.

So I use that. I use that choosing as an opportunity to share with others just my journey and just my heart, and helping them remind themselves that there are obstacles, so as actually seeing the totality of ourselves and integrating that. But there can be tremendous joy in suffering. And so that's the work that I do. I'm really not a psychobabble being. [CHORTLES] I'm really about like, what is your full expression?

And so it just so happens then that the people who come to me might be of the global majority, might be queer on some spectrum, might be the fringe of the fringe. I think I just have a penchant for attracting those peoples. And so we all have internalized stuff. So I think a lot of what I do with people is I'm be transparent. I'm like, I'm also doing the work with you and I've-- and this is how I'm showing up. And there's always a way with which I can hold all of myself in the presence of even a space where I'm only allowed to be this much of myself.

And deep listening and witnessing, I mean, it's so-- in some ways, it's so simple, and to not be distracted and really holding people's light and their vision. You know, people do express to me what their vision of liberation is, and I just I just hold that. And I use humor. And I'm like, don't forget, you know? Like, you know, the ways with which we hide from seeing our own brilliance, right? We all do this in some ways. And so that's a lot of what I do. And a lot-- and it's transitioning as it always is. But getting people uncomfortable with the discomfort in within themselves so that brilliance can be is really what I do.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you. And another interesting and cool part of your chapter I found was it's-- in some ways, it's not explicit-- but deep connection to the Four Noble Truths. And of course, in Buddhism, we have these Four Noble Truths of there being suffering, dukkha, and there being an-- an origin to that through its exploration, and also a cessation, or at least in some-- many cases-- at least a lowering, even if not full cessation, but also that path to get there. And the chapter is basically structured right along those lines. And there is one really nice point at the fulcrum of that. And would you mind reading that, or do you have that with you for the flow?

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: Yeah, I do.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Section on the flow?

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: It's actually what I was going to select. I won't read the whole section. I'll pick that up, yeah. So this is a section from the flow. "In order to achieve a sense of freedom, a freedom beyond any law or rule of humans, we must free the mind. It is a path of spiritual warriorship to deeply befriend this human experience while also remembering that our essence expands far beyond the limits of our definitions or those imposed by others. We have been so focused on social liberation, on lasting change in social systems, that we bypass ultimate liberation-- the freedom of mind that sees the innate abundance and connectedness of all things. We have the capacity to hold and fight for both."

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you. So powerful and so beautiful. Thank you. And next, I also wondered if you might briefly introduce-- following that, you talk about the three doors of liberation, so in terms of more this path to the relief of suffering. Would you mind briefly introducing that as well?

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: Yeah, not at all. I'm going to introduce it a little slightly different than how it's introduced in the book and just kind of keep it simple and also like, just-- this is just what we do, as humans, it's kind of-- I find it kind of funny the way that we're continuously on the path of discovery. I begin this section specifically speaking to-- since it's my orientation, what I could speak to best, like being Black is being a part of the Bodhisattva path.

And these Bodhisattvas are beings that recognize their-- their essence is enlightened and brilliant. And they delay their, I'm going to say their lifetime of resort, if you will, their heaven, their however you want to call that space where there's great ease, so that they can offer help to others who are still seeking their own liberation.

And-- and wow, that's thankless work. And so sometimes, I connect it to even just the work that I do. It is thankless work in many ways to continually try to do that. But what a blessing. And it's with the understanding that we're all connected. Like, I can't do-- and I can't be free knowing that you're out there struggling and suffering. I can't rest my head. And I think that that way of being is-- and being continuously is just not-- it's something that we forget. And we need to continually remind ourselves. So that's where these three doors come in as reminders that there is a way.

And the first door, being emptiness. And basically, we love our egos. Egos are not bad. And-- and also, they can be far more spacious and fluid than they are. And they are everything all at once. And so instead of concretizing who and how we define ourselves moment to moment, like, how can we have some-- loosen that? How can we have some sense of fluidity in the possibility of in any given moment arising as something else, you know? And that could be playful. I'm a big person of humor and play. And so that-- if you're doing something for one second, that is your identity for that one second. So like, why not-- why not take that in?

So that's the first. And knowing that who I am is interdependent to where I am, to who I'm engaging with. And that changes every minute. I mean, think about what it might be like being with your family. You're completely different with your family than with maybe your friends, you know? So you arise differently.

And that's wonderful. What a wonderful mistake to have happen. So already, you can sense-- you know, and if you think about times where you had the space to be somewhere else, even when we vacation and what that felt like, you know, that that embodiment offers a little bit of freedom from the constriction of our typical egoic mind.

The nexus is signless-- signlessness. And you know, again, along the continuum of allowing things to dissolve, like, understanding that things do, quote unquote, "have an end," but rather that they transform into something else, you know? It just keeps mutating into something else, into something else, a self arising in that way. And I spoke about this specifically about-- again, about how we form our identity. And also, specifically, Black identity is very much formed on white frames, or majority frames, whatever the majority is in that space.

And I would even wager, because this was a little while ago that I wrote this, that I wish I had emphasized more just simply focusing on one's interiority, that that in and of itself, like, actually expands the whole field from outside the constructs of race, and capitalism, and oppressions, which are really, like, the three lenses with which I am often defined against and for. And so even if I was just to attend to what's going on within myself, that in and of itself allows my experience and my way of knowing to expand and transform to something else outside that frame.

And the third is aimlessness. I am-- I am one of agency. Sometimes I'm like, that's my five-year plan, you know? Does anyone else have that, where they are engaging in a grind towards something? I don't know what we're grinding towards, but we're grinding towards something. And that could be a really finite path. And it doesn't offer the opportunity, one, at that pace and at the pace that we're in right now to really notice, you know, like, notice from a cellular level, notice what we are experiencing in every given moment.

And I find a lot of people in my experience are always like, what should I do? What should I do? And they're churning to figure this out. And perhaps the question to contemplate more is like, well, what is life trying to do with you? What can you allow? And so that offers, again, more-- you know, when I think about liberation, I always think about space, you know, and it's an expansion. And so already when we entertain that question, we're looking, we're opening our gaze onto the horizon to see what signs and what is life teaching me and showing me in this moment to inform what I might do next.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you so much. Wonderfully encapsulated. And as kind of a closing note, in your chapter, but maybe also for our particular conversation here, you mentioned Stevie Wonder's poem As. Or I should say-- well, it is a poem, but a song as well. And would you mind reciting even part of that poem as well?

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: Sure. I will not-- I will spare you all. Like, I am not a singer. I really wish--

[LAUGHTER]

But for those of you who do not know Stevie Wonder, brilliant American singer, songwriter, musician, record producer. And not to be confused with Ray Charles, who is another genius of caliber. I mean, they call him The Genius. But they have since transitioned. But Stevie Wonder is still with us. Thank great gratefulness of that.

And he was a being who was born prematurely and was also born without sight. And one could say that that is a tremendous obstacle. But we have other sense faculties to move through. And so his life and his compositions have produced, for me, the amazing visual imagery for not having seen, if you will.

And so this song called As, again, circling back to my centering of heart and love, has a tremendous amount of dharma in it. I could pick really any one of his songs and his dharma, but just to read these verses. "So make sure when you say you're in it but not of it, you're not helping to make this Earth a place sometimes called hell. Change your words into truth and then change that truth into love. And maybe our children's grandchildren and their great grandchildren will tell. I'll be loving you until the rainbows burst the stars out in the sky, loving you until the ocean covers every mountain high, loving you until the dolphin flies and parrots live at sea, loving you until we dream of life and life becomes a dream." Thank you.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you. So great. Thank you. And thank you for that whole conversation. And so finally, we're going to shift over to Jeffrey. And opening up-- and so Jeffrey, your chapter was entitled-- this powerful image in the title-- Lotus in a Sea of Fire and the Hong Kong Case in 2019 and 2020.

And again, it-- a large part of that chapter deals with these protests that were occurring in Hong Kong. And you were in the midst of that at that time. I wonder if you might start us out by just describing a bit. Since media reports anywhere always only give us one little frame into a picture. But from the ground, what was that-- what was being in that like for you? And what was it actually like on the ground there?

JEFFREY NG: Yeah. Thank you, Nathan. Yes, it's very difficult for me to condense, like, the three or four years of experiences. Like, I do think the social movement-- social movement right now is kind of suppressed, but it's like a continuum. Like, it transition to be continued, continuing in a different form. But like, I just rewind my time back to 2019 and 2020 in general.

So I do have the same concern about media. Like, I also ask this question when I had the chance to meet with my fellow mindfulness teachers in Ukraine. So I also asked them about these questions, like, things that actually happened for you personally instead of just looking through the lens of media. So I agree that sometimes media may present the world in a simplified view. So the reality can be more complex and quite emotionally charged, to be honest.

So in the initial stages of the Hong Kong protest, which started in June 2019, which was like, four years ago, I remember walking through the streets during a large rally that took place in June four years ago. The atmosphere was charged, but largely peaceful, to be honest, at the very beginning, with an estimated 1 million people participating in the large protest.

Various groups were present-- students wearing their school logos, professionals in suits, and activists handing out flyers, even families with young children. It felt like a collective expression of democratic values. And the air was actually filled with peaceful chants and the waving of those cards and slogans.

However, when the weeks-- as the weeks progressed and the atmosphere began to change, I recall that the incident on July 21, 2019, where suspected Triad members, or gangsters, attacked protesters and commuters in MTR station. MTR station is a train station in Hong Kong. And the peaceful atmosphere became, like, very violent. And then it seems that the atmosphere also changes during the days when we have a large group of people demonstrating on the street during daytime. And during night time, it becomes a battlefield between the protesters and the police.

And Hong Kong is very special. It's a very super condensed city. And there's no way for us to escape from this. I'm now in US. So I can feel that if you don't like this place, you can relocate to some other places, to other regions. But Hong Kong is very special, like Singapore. We kind of crowded. And there is no way of escaping from this atmosphere.

So initially, the protest was, like, concentrated in business areas like Central, Causeway Bay, or [INAUDIBLE], which are largely located in the southern part of Hong Kong. But the protests began to disperse into residential neighborhoods as well and even reached the international airport leading to its temporary closure somewhat in August 2019.

And one evening that still stands out in my memory is that after a long day at school-- I was still a graduate student at Hong Kong U at that time-- I was making my way home by the train expecting nothing more than usual commute. However, that sense of being normal was shattered when teargas started to fill the station. The air turned really thick, very acidic. And it's very unpleasant. The smell was really unpleasant. And if you have ever had the taste of the tear gas, you will never forget how acidic that can be.

And it was making me difficult to breathe at all. And then panic set in as people scramble to find exits, to take another train. And their faces became fearful. And there are much discomfort as well. It was a terrifying experience for me until now. I still remember very vividly right now that the reality of our everyday life in Hong Kong have been disrupted.

And then it just was really no longer the Hong Kong that I knew. It had become a battleground when even the simple act of transportation or commuting becomes very risky. And then this dispersion of protests around different areas in Hong Kong was kind of more of a strength of spreading the message, but also a challenge because that creates more conflicts in different areas in Hong Kong. Even the protesters and the kind of normal residents, they kind of entangled into very violent acts some times.

So besides very visible events, there is an atmosphere of fear in Hong Kong looming over the city as well because it's kind of like there is an unpredictability and uncertainty surrounding the areas. You never knew what would happen next and where. You may see police standing at every corner in the streets, and their action seemed to be very arbitrary. And it's kind of adding to the sense of psychological insecurity.

And when I was walking down a very familiar street for waiting for a train, there was always a lingering fear that something could go wrong at any moment of time. That constant state of alertness was really mentally draining, exhausting, and created a collective atmosphere of tension and apprehension as well.

And besides witnessing the event physically, witnessing the event unfolding on the news was quite distressing as well because the images was so shocking, like, police using forces, firing rubber bullets at very close range, and deploying water cannons against protesters. And each news report seemed to escalate the tension. And it stirred a complex mix of emotion within the community as well. There was anger at the use of power, there fear for the safety of those on the streets, and a profound sense of helplessness as well.

One incident that still struck me was the protest happening at the Chinese University of Hong Kong in November four years ago. CUHK Is actually my alma mater. I was a college student at Chinese U, a place where I spent years studying and building friendships. To see it transform into a battleground was certainly heart-- heart-wrenching. The news-- I haven't-- like, was not there physically. But I kind of catch up the news during the midnight. I didn't really go to sleep.

I was watching reporters, journalists there, like, reporting the event. So it was like scenes of intense clashes between protesters and police in the campus within the very familiar buildings that I was when I was a college student. So it turned into war zone, like, tear gases and rubber bullets were fired. And protesters were using Molotov cocktails. Like, they they self mix-- they mix reference. So they use this to oppose the police. So it was really surreal and deeply personal to see such chaos erupt in a place that had been a sanctuary of my learning experiences.

And I want to go on this-- how this thing really happened to become an emotional crisis in Hong Kong. Like, the Hong Kong population experienced some secondary traumatic stress and depression. And it was reported by several studies as well. And I had the opportunity to hold some workshops for those distressed participants through a Buddhist organization in Hong Kong.

People came in with very heavy hearts. Their faces were imprinted with anxiety and despair. And many shared stories of insomnia, sleeplessness, and constant anxiety, loss of appetite. And there was even no motivation to kind of continue with the very simple daily tasks as well. And they actually came from all different generations-- students, professionals, parents, and even elderly members of the community. So I think the impact of the social unrest was really indiscriminable across different ages, occupations, and also social status as well.

So these workshops were becoming-- these workshops became a very strong social support and mental support to them. And the role of Buddhist organizations during that period was debatable. On one hand, our organizations were able to do some emotional and mental health support work. We organized workshops, and mindfulness and meditation sessions, and community dialogues. So we aimed at easing the emotional and psychological distress during the time.

But on the other hand, there is a significant portion of the Buddhist community that has been absent from the discourse. We had one third of the population who self-claimed to be Buddhist in Hong Kong. There is-- the community, the Buddhist community, is often perceived as apathetic to political conflicts, especially during time in 2019 and 2020.

I do think it's partly because of the spiritual focus of Buddhism, which is like, traditionally construed to be inner peace, construe to be detached from worldly affairs. While this approach has its merits, it has led to some criticisms in society-- in society. And the community calls for more active engagement from the community as well. So that's quickly some of my observations in Hong Kong, it went from physical observations, from emotional distress, and to the roles of Buddhist organizations in Hong Kong.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Yeah, thank you. And just to wrap up a little though, you also had a lot in your chapter about dependent origination and the value of dependent origination on changing these conceptions and internal perspectives as well. So would you mind just a minute or two of describing what that idea of dependent origination meant for you during that period and how you used that?

JEFFREY NG: Oh, yes. So when people ask me what Buddhism is-- like, many of my friends are not Buddhist at all. And they will always ask me, why you got into Buddhism and what Buddhism actually is in? I will just explain that Buddhism is all about dependent origination. And my own very simple explanation is the phenomenon is always caused by infinite number of conditions. So it's my very simple definition of dependent origination. And it really helped me a lot during the crisis.

So in early days of the protest, I was on-- I was of no exception. I was overwhelmed by emotion as well. And there were anger and frustrations. And I had certain expectations of justice and freedom in Hong Kong, to be honest. Like, we kind of enjoy very high autonomy of freedom before protest. And then it seems that the root of these emotions lay in the-- the gap between expectation and reality.

So one particular thing I still recall is when I got back to the office, a colleague of mine had been arrested. That wasn't just a headline. That was someone I knew, someone I had shared conversations with every day. So there is a very-- it is really shocking to see reality changes very quickly. But then I kind of think about this from a doctrine of dependent origination. I'm beginning to see these events in a different light.

I realized that my emotions were not just reactions to incidents, but was actually part of a interplay of condition and causes as well. And it's really transformative is because I can help-- I understand that my emotions are caused by different conditions and factors. And I also learned that this phenomenon happening in society are caused by different emotions-- with different kinds of conditions and causes as well.

This helps me because I do not find myself to be a victim of labeling. Usually, during this time, during the time that emotions were high, I have a tendency to find a single figure so that I can point fingers with them-- point fingers to them. I can have some entities, some objects to blame. Like, maybe it's about the police, maybe about the political figure in society, or maybe just about the protester-- why are they so violent?

So this labeling was some kind of a mental construct that I grasped at. And then this grasping leads me to-- to the manifestation of emotions inside myself. But if I learn that things are composed of different conditions, I will kind of understand that even the police, even the government, the protesters are not just single entity. There are different conditions that shaped these collectives.

And this helped me really dissolve the energy-- the enemy image I had constructed within myself. It was just like a mental construct had lifted, allowing me to see the situation in a more nuanced light. But to be honest, this doesn't really-- I don't want to trivialize or gloss over violence and peace. And dependent origination doesn't work that way.

Dependent origination is-- is actually an empowering-- empowering doctrine. It's because we cannot step-- we cannot label a human as-- we cannot reduce a human to be-- human being to be a single label. It's because we are so interconnected. And my understanding of dependent origination is interconnectedness. So it is easy to get caught up with labels and identities, especially in a politically charged environment. However, this label as just deconstruct that [INAUDIBLE] our wholeness, the richness of our human experiences.

So as a spiritual caregiver myself, we have to serve the community, whether it is labeled as a protester, whether it is labeled as a pro-government person. My role is to serve the community and recognizing that community itself is a web of interconnected beings, each with their own struggles, aspirations. And we all experience suffering, joy, fear, and hope as well.

So this kind of embodiment of interconnectedness has empowered me to serve the community more effectively. So when I approach individuals, I try to see them not as isolated entities, but as part of a larger community that suffer together-- that suffer together.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thanks. Thank you very much for all your insights into the situation and the handling, the way you and others were working together to handle that. Just briefly to transition us from that, I wonder if we can go to Victor again just for one minute. And he'll lead us in a very short meditation contemplation as we transition into the final Q&A part.

VICTOR GABRIEL: Thank you. Having heard from these wonderful speakers, maybe you can think of what resonated with you, what touched you deeply, what aroused your curiosity, what inspired you to act further, what kind of loving actions are you going to carry out after our talk. And we also rejoice. Rejoice in the good that the Buddhas and Bodhisattvas have done, and all the good that this poll has brought-- this talk has brought, how much it's inspired us on our life's journey. Then we dedicate this for the healing of our world and for the enlightenment of all beings. Thank you.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: Thank you. And we welcome Monica back on.

MONICA SANFORD: Well, thank you everyone for that wonderful presentation and for those lovely meditations and poems and sharing your experience. Jeffrey, we really appreciate that so much. We do have a few questions. I'm just going to answer them. Well, I'm not going to answer them. I'm going to pose them to the panel. I feel like some of them are directed, but I'm just going to pose them as general questions and let the panelists volunteer if they'd like to answer.

The first question comes from Jill, who asks, how does white supremacy in the United States and colonialism worldwide impact crisis care and/or how have Buddhist caregivers responded to these systemic oppressions while offering care? So if anyone would like to unmute and address Jill's question about how white supremacy impacts crisis care and how Buddhist caregivers are responding to that. So that question came in quite early, right as we transitioned between Victor's talk and Dr. G. So maybe if one of you would like to address that topic.

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: I can begin the conversation. And I'll just start specifically around, you know, how the ground of these constructs start really, whether we call it white supremacy, or communism, or whatever we want to call it, whatever the oppressive system is. I think they come from the ground of a deep understanding that there's self and there's other. And the more that we concretize in our orientation towards other, the easier it is to, as we've seen across history, devalue, be violent towards, not consider, and also not see other as a part of.

And so when we talk about-- everyone spoke about some degree of liberation coming from a space of understanding the inseparability of self and other. With that kind of mentality, that wall there, it becomes very difficult to actually provide care and see that care is needed in these spaces. So I want to start the conversation there and invite Victor or anybody else who would like to continue it.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you, Dr. G. So that it comes kind of from that mistaken view that we are all separate beings. And from that mistaken view, it allows us to devalue some people or even dehumanize them. Yeah. Victor, what would you like to add?

VICTOR GABRIEL: Maybe just this little piece on training of Buddhist chaplains, right? So Buddhist chaplains, their field of Buddhist chaplaincy has been very conscious about this and how the effects of supremacy has led to certain definitions of our terms. Like, we addressed compassion before, but there are many, many, many terms, even chaplaincy itself and what is spiritual care.

One of the steps that has been done that I've seen over the transition of my career since I started teaching in 2010 is the inclusion of Asian voices, the inclusion of people of color's voices, the inclusion of lived Buddhist experience as opposed to Buddhist experience from the text, you know, how it was focused on the sutra, and now it focuses on the other baskets or other sections of the sutra collection.

And the movement from meditation and to popular ritual, how people-- how Buddhists in Buddhist heritage countries-- even that term, Buddhist heritage countries-- deal with their issues in popular religion. So all that is being included. That has been very generative here in America and in the West, and helps us rethink how that indeed, our definition of spiritual care, or health care, or healing is very narrow. And then we can push the boundaries wider.

MONICA SANFORD: Yeah. Thank you for sharing, Victor. Just to give a little context, we did a survey with Buddhist chaplains in North America a couple of years ago. And we weren't even sure how many Buddhist chaplains we would find. But 425 responded to our survey.

And what was interesting to those of us who were doing the research, we didn't expect to find this, but about-- between 2/3 and 3/4 identified as white. And there's some wiggle room in that because a lot of people didn't want to answer the racial question. So we can't be exactly sure. But somewhere between about-- less than a fifth identified as Asian-American. And then there was a small number of other BIPOC and Indigenous identities represented there.

But that was surprising to us because we were familiar with the statistics on Buddhism in the United States that have come out from the Pew forum and other sources that 2/3 of Buddhists in the United States are of Asian-American heritage. So why is it that 2/3 of the chaplains are White? So we're asking these questions continuously.

Is it because many of these chaplains also identify that their family of origin was not Buddhist, so they've converted to Buddhism? Were they familiar with what a chaplain is from their upbringing? Are Asian-American Buddhists not going into the field?

Are they going into the field and then being driven out of the field by systemic oppression and the Christian hegemony that still operates as an umbrella over the entire field of chaplaincy? Did they just not get the survey? Were we just not posting it in the right places? That's also-- you know, that's also a problem as researchers. Maybe we just weren't reaching the right people.

So these questions are very much on our mind. But what I do see is that in terms of crisis care, a lot of us are chaplains and we work with chaplains, or we're caregivers in other forms, but in disaster recovery care, I see wonderful, wonderful programs being operated by Asian and Asian-American Buddhist organizations.

The Tzu Chi Organization comes to mind. Their disaster recovery program worldwide, but also in the Asian Pacific Rim, is an amazing example of how they are leading the way. And we can really actually learn from them, you know, how to take care of people in crisis. They have so much institutional knowledge at this point. So we need to keep building these networks and partnerships as much as we possibly can and learning from each other.

OK, I'm going to go on to our next question. Rita asks, comfortable with discomfort-- keyed in on that phrase, I believe, in Doc's talk-- is this a way-- is this a way that you can bridge the gap between your true self and the sliver of self that must interface with others who maybe aren't aware of the path? And I would love to hear you elaborate on comfort with discomfort.

CLAUDELLE R. GLASGOW: Thank you for that question. These are wonderful questions. Hmm. Hmm. I have a habit of dissecting a question. So I apologize in advance. But this piece about might not-- those who might not be aware of the path is so curious to me. Because I actually do think that regardless of people's affiliated denomination, that people know truth. And people do see.

And then there's delusion. And so we create all sorts of smoke and obscuration for actually seeing what is in our reality, period. It doesn't have to be on the level of what we're talking about. It could be anything, like, how we define something and what we choose to see in any given moment, and our psychological and heart capacities to be able to allow that to be.

And so I just wanted to-- I couldn't help but-- I had to make a note on that because I do think that that's the ground of any tolerance of discomfort, right? We're always met with difference in how we are experiencing our world because we're all different peoples of all different perspectives. And so even being able to listen to another share about a common experience, you know, like, we all kind of, quote unquote, "worldwide" had a common experience of some kind of pandemic, and sickness, and death, and some adjustment to go through.

And we're all talking about it differently. And look at what's happened out of that conversation. There's been-- at least in the West. I can only speak to here. There have been these just hard and fast labels that have happened and then no conversation.

And so I feel like even just in that orientation, we're losing the ability to deeply listen to other's perspective so that it can fully-- more fully inform what a full experience of anything is, whether that's of the self or whether that is of what we're seeing as being a reality in that moment. So yeah, I just really want to encourage us to all work these edges of what we see as not-- or not unaligned.

Because then, we're really shutting down other possibilities. I mean, there are 84,000 ways to awareness and enlightenment. We're cutting all that down to maybe 0.5, you know? We're not seeing the whole thing. We're not allowing all of it in.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you for that, Doc. Would Victor or Jeffrey or Nathan like to chime in on that comfortable with discomfort? You know, working in crisis care, there is a lot of discomfort. And how do we get to a place-- maybe comfortable isn't even the right word-- but maybe just where we can be in that space?

JEFFREY NG: Yeah, I would like to add something. It's like any discomfort, I think, is common. The issue is, like, there are things and phenomenon happening in the world we cannot turn a blind eye to. So discomfort-- we got to accept discomfort is common, it's a common phenomenon that we as humans in this world are experiencing, that being comfortable with discomfort is like by acknowledging discomfort, we have a choice to respond to it.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you, Jeffrey. OK, I'm going to-- one more question and then we can wrap up. So Edward asks about the diversity of Buddhist traditions and thoughts and the diversity of audiences that we work with, and wonders, what are the challenges of applying one's personal background with chaplaincy work in this diverse field, both in majority Buddhist spaces and minority Buddhist spaces?

So as I'm hearing that question, I'm reflecting on what I hear from college Buddhist chaplains very often, is a college-- I hear from college Buddhist chaplains who are trained in a particular branch of Buddhism. And yet, the students who come can be from any branch of Buddhism. And then the other-- and then the larger student body is just majority not Buddhist at all. So they're working across intra-Buddhist diversity, as well as inter-Buddhist diversity. Now that's one setting.

But I'm wondering, in your particular settings what challenges with both Buddhist diversity and then intra-religious diversity are you experiencing? And how do you deal with those? Victor, can I call on you for this one? Or Nathan.

VICTOR GABRIEL: I had a feeling. [CHUCKLES] I think of the-- go back to my background. University of the West has many different Buddhist traditions represented and as well as having those with other religious backgrounds or no religious backgrounds present. And I think the main piece I think we don't talk often of enough is cultural or religious humility.

We just accept that, you know, the blessed one, when he came here, he didn't preach just three years, right? He preached-- you know, he was enlightened at 35. And he passed away at 80. So that length of time, you know? And he himself said, to some, I have taught as self. So oh, my gosh. He contradicted himself also.

So then-- so we have to have the cultural humility that our Buddhism may not be someone else's Buddhism, but it works for them. And if it works for them, then it's good for them. And it's going to get them somewhere, from a place of discomfort, from a place of suffering, to a place of liberation. Yeah, and it's good for them. So that's the first piece. It's good-- we have to accept it's good for them.

And then the second thing is that, oh, maybe I can also learn something about that. There's some relevance to me and my Buddhism. So yeah, I found that very helpful. And then you can also do, yeah, whatever religious path or no religious path. And I think-- I tend to think like Dr. G. We are all on a spiritual path, whether we subscribe to a name on a named path or not. We are all on a religious path. And yeah, so there's something that I can learn from on your path. Yeah, OK. Thank you.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you, Victor. Nathan, I'd like to give you the last word of this whole webinar before we wrap up.

NATHAN JISHIN MICHON: I guess-- yeah, unrelated to that note, it's funny both in the context as an editor for this book and working with different chaplains around Japan, Buddhist chaplains around Japan, I would sometimes have conversations with people about editing, just little aspects of the chapter because something says, Buddhism is, or Buddhism says. And I'd be like, could we open this up a little bit more? Because I recognize that your Buddhism does say this, but this might-- this isn't necessarily representative of all Buddhisms.

And so there were-- of course, it's very natural, whether in that writing context or-- like with many of the Buddhist chaplains here in Japan, you're trained in your tradition. You're practiced deep in your tradition. You go through that. And that's mostly what you're familiar with. And so some of these assumptions about what Buddhism is very naturally from within our own tradition.

But that experience of really taking that effort to get out and learn about others, really break down these barriers, especially from a chaplain's perspective, it can be very important. But I think in general too, both for more responsibly caring for others to really learn about what these different-- what these differences are, but also for learning about ourselves, these kind of interactions with people from traditions that we might not be used to. It also creates some of the greatest opportunities for self-reflection as well and brings up some of the greatest opportunities and questions about how we can really learn about our own assumptions, that we carry and grow outwardly from that.

MONICA SANFORD: Thank you, thank you, thank you. I want to wrap up just by thanking Dr. Michon, Victor Gabriel, Dr. G, Jeffrey Ng for all of our wonderful presentations. We hope that this will be the first in a multi-part series. So please pay attention to the-- wherever you found this one, we'll try to advertise it again. But you can also pay attention to the news and events space on the Harvard Divinity School website at hds.harvard.edu to sign up for the next one, which we are tentatively scheduling now for early November, and then hoping that we'll have the third one sometime January or early February of next year, and possibly wrap up because for sections of the book, for webinars if we can get the authors to join us.

So thank you so much. I also want to send a special note of thanks to the Robert HN Ho Family Foundation, which supports the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School, which provides the funding for wonderful events such as these, and to Jonathan Makransky, who is-- you can't see him but he is here on the webinar in the background coordinating the infinite-- the 84,000 things, the infinite number of things that have to happen to make a webinar like this happen. And he just does it so beautifully. So send your thanks and gratitude to him. And we dedicate the merit of all of these programs to alleviate the suffering of all beings everywhere. So thank you, thank you, thank you.

SPEAKER 2: Sponsor-- the Buddhist Ministry Initiative at Harvard Divinity School.

SPEAKER 1: Copyright 2023, President and Fellows of Harvard College.