“Compassion can be as simple as having a wish to see the other person relieved from suffering,
but in order for that compassion to be altruistic there needs to be an urge on your part,
of wanting to do something about it.” -Thupten Jinpa

“And let us reorient our compassion to be mindful not only of who suffered and died then,
but who is dying now.” -Serene Jones

Please join the Thích Nhất Hạnh Program for Engaged Buddhism and Compassion Institute for a conversation with Tibetan Buddhist scholar, translator and author, Thupten Jinpa and president of Union Theological Seminary, Serene Jones. Compassion is a central value in all major religions, and also what the world is in need of on all levels more and more each hour. This conversation with Thupten Jinpa who has devoted so much time and effort to understanding human compassion and its cultivation along with UTS President Serene Jones who has a deep grounding in social justice will not be one to miss!

RSVP Today!

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Thupten Jinpa, Ph.D. was trained as a monk at the Shartse College of Ganden Monastic University, South India, where he received the Geshe Lharam degree. Jinpa also holds a B.A. in philosophy and a Ph.D. in religious studies, both from Cambridge University.

Jinpa has been the principal English translator to H.H. the Dalai Lama since 1985, and has translated and collaborated on numerous books by the Dalai Lama including the New York Times Bestsellers Ethics for the New Millennium and The Art of Happiness, as well as Beyond Religion: Ethics for a Whole World. His own publications include A Fearless Heart: How the Courage to be Compassionate Can Transform Our Lives and translations of major Tibetan works featured in The Library of Tibetan Classics series. Jinpa is the main author of Compassion Cultivation Training™ (CCT™) developed at Stanford University in 2009, now housed at the Compassion Institute.

A frequent speaker at various international conferences on mindfulness, compassion, and contemplative practice, Jinpa serves as an adjunct professor at the Faculty of Religious Studies at McGill University, Montreal and is the founder and president of Compassion Institute and the Institute of Tibetan Classics. He has been a core member of the Mind and Life Institute and its Chairman of the Board since January 2012.

Rev. Dr. Serene Jones is a highly respected scholar and public intellectual, and the 16th President of the historic Union Theological Seminary in the City of New York. The first woman to head the 182-year-old institution, Jones occupies the Johnston Family Chair for Religion and Democracy. She is a Past President of the American Academy of Religion, which annually hosts the world’s largest gathering of scholars of religion. Jones came to Union after seventeen years at Yale University, where she was the Titus Street Professor of Theology at the Divinity School, and Chair of the University’s Program in Women, Gender and Sexuality Studies. She is the author of several books including Trauma and Grace and, most recently, her memoir Call It Grace: Finding Meaning in a Fractured World. Jones, a popular public speaker, is sought by media to comment on major issues impacting society because of her deep grounding in theology, politics, women’s studies, economics, race studies, history, and ethics.