Lama Denys at the Parliament of the Worlds' Religions

how can religion meet that the life conditions that we're in the midst of and and and will it have to change will it have to evolve to move into the to move into the future or or how do we need it do we need are Are there specific Traditions that can help us what what do they have to say about the about about the the crisis in the world now or do we even need a new tradition to go into this the future so those are all kind of all the issues we're kind of looking at um so maybe just start with you're you come from the Buddhist tradition and the Tibetan Buddhist tradition yes so what do what do you see as the challenges of uh of Tibetan Buddhism and your tradition what do you see how does it need to move into the future how does it how does it need to change to meet the 21st century well in terms of religion and spirituality MH I'd like to quote um a motto that came in '97 in a meeting around the Dal Lama with indigenous people from the five continents mhm the the motto is the world as is fed up of religions when it starve for spirituality mhm so it has to be interpreted MH mean we don't want any more dogmatic MH mhm approach mhm right if you give to the absolute different names and you become chosen people of the E whichever name and of you do Crusade and Jihad MH MH Bast so spirituality is based on experience mhm mhm and is based on the common experience right you Human family common experience and uh so this is in Buddhist terms what we share with the golden rule this principle of nonviolence of compassion of love but by the Golden Rule you mean the by the Golden Rule I mean do not do to the other the violence you wouldn't like to be the victim of right right and it has different formulation but uh don't consider the other as yourself right and have the same love and the same compassion for your brother sister than you have for yourself in an image be like your right and left hands right and left and not opposite if the left hand is wounded the right one will take care of the left as if it was itself and if the right is wounded the left would be the same it's a great metaphor because a same organism same body and we all in the global interance are part of a greater body MH MH so this awareness um can bring uh ground for uh Global human good heart people synergy mhm a Civil Society of good-hearted people of a world citizen right World citizen right right simply we have to be World citizens now not citizens of a nation is that we you know citizens of a Nation or even members of just of a particular religious tradition or just we can be we can be citizen of a Nation I'm an European and European Paradigm is quite interesting because you can be of a Nation but still work in a in a network in a higher uh level of organization right right and exactly the idea is to get that globally speaking Global government Global governance it's better and this is possible you I'm teasing uh both American and European we claim to be Democrats mhm it's not true we are hypocrite Democrats because we are democratic among ourselves between our group our nation would it be the American would it bus the French whever but then we build Collective egos which behave in between them themselves in an imperialistic game of power that's interesting uhhuh so there only Collective egos that's that's an interesting idea yeah National ego is but Collective ego fighting in an egoistic way which mean without any altruism without any love without any compassion Dal Lama often talk of um compassionate business a changes cooperation cooperation is a win-win strategy uhuh right cooperation rather than competition mhh so such a dynamic Can U engage through Civil Society so let's speak for that and uh Civil Society you know if the Civil Society is aware and and we can uh we can make a difference each one of us can make a difference and together we are much more than the sum of our own individuality