Press Releases

Apr 10, 2001
Vietnamese Zen Master Thich Nhat Hanh Offers Path to Love and Understanding

Buddhist Monk's Only New York Appearance Is at Southampton College

Contact:
Darren Johnson
(631) 287 8313
Fax: (631) 283 4081

Revered Buddhist monk Thich Nhat Hanh will make his only Tri-State public appearance of the year at Southampton College of Long Island University on May 19 with a talk entitled "The Path to Love and Understanding."

The event will be held in the Southampton College Gym on Tuckahoe Road in Southampton on Saturday, May 19, at 8 p.m. Tickets are $25 and can be purchased by calling the College's Alumni/Development Office at 631-287-8347. Proceeds benefit Friends World, a global study program at Southampton College, and Plum Village (www.plumvillage.com), the Buddhist community and spiritual retreat center in France founded by Thich Nhat Hanh.

Known to his followers simply as Thay, Vietnamese for teacher, Thich Nhat Hanh (pronounced Tick-Naught-Han) is a Vietnamese Buddhist monk who still today is exiled from his homeland because of his attempts to reconcile the two sides in the Vietnam War. A widely published author and poet, he taught at Princeton and Columbia before starting his Plum Village Retreat in southwestern France in the early 1980s. In 1997, he founded the Green Dharma Center and Maple Forest Monastery in Vermont. Last year, Dear Park Monastery, a meditation center, was opened near San Diego, Calif.

The essence of Thay's teaching is that achieving world peace requires a transformation within each individual. In a time of fast-paced technology and strife, he has found a way to walk calmly with peace and awareness. Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. nominated him for the Nobel Peace Prize in 1967, adding, "I do not personally know of anyone more worthy...than this gentle monk from Vietnam."

From his Plum Village spiritual community, Thay, 73, works to help refugees worldwide. His mindfulness retreats in Europe and North America help veterans, families, environmentalists, psychotherapists, artists and many thousands of individuals who seek inner peace and a more harmonious life. Most recently, he has helped distribute and define UNESCO's Manifesto 2000, which seeks to create a culture of peace and non-violence.

After his May 19 public appearance, Thay will be Commencement Speaker and receive an honorary degree at Southampton College's graduation ceremonies on May 20 at 2 p.m. on the West Lawn of Chancellors Hall. In the event of rain, Commencement will be held in the Gym, and attendance will be limited to graduates and their families. These will be Thay's only scheduled Tri-State appearances of the year. On May 18 at 7 p.m. he is scheduled to speak in Boston at the Hynes Auditorium.

Thay is involved in "Engaged Buddhism", which means applying one's spiritual practice into daily life to help relieve suffering. In Saigon he established one of the most influential centers of Buddhist studies, the An Quang Pagoda. He also set up relief organizations to rebuild destroyed villages, instituted the School of Youth for Social Service and urged world leaders to use nonviolence as a tool. When Thay left Vietnam, he helped organize rescue missions well into the 1970s for Vietnamese trying to escape from political oppression.

He has written more than 75 books of prose, poetry and chants, and his teachings reach not just Buddhists, but audiences of all religions. His most popular book, "Being Peace," is now in its 14th printing with hundreds of thousands of copies in print.

"Thich Nhat Hahn is one of the most important world spiritual leaders of our time. He embodies the principles of engagement with world problems that are so important to our Friends World students," said Lewis Greenstein, Dean of Friends World which offers a comparative religion course in three different countries. "We are honored that he has agreed to come to Southampton College to help us celebrate graduation."

Friends World graduates will participate in graduation activities all day on Saturday, May 19, including thesis presentations by each student about his or her studies. Since 1965, Friends World students have carried out studies in over 75 countries, making a reality of the phrase "the world is your campus." The program involves classroom study, immersion language training and independent fieldwork in at least two foreign centers/cultures. Under faculty guidance, students develop skills and competencies in a major academic field by combining research, hands-on experience and analytical writing. The program is currently based at Long Island University's Southampton College. Friends World has centers in the U.S., China, Ghana, Costa Rica, England, India, Israel and Japan.