{"id":2215,"date":"2010-05-24T17:21:08","date_gmt":"2010-05-24T17:21:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blog.beliefnet.com\/news\/2010\/05\/in-last-nyc-stop-dalai-lama-di.php"},"modified":"2010-05-24T17:21:08","modified_gmt":"2010-05-24T17:21:08","slug":"in-last-nyc-stop-dalai-lama-di","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/2010\/05\/in-last-nyc-stop-dalai-lama-di","title":{"rendered":"In Last NYC Stop, Dalai Lama Discusses Kinship"},"content":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK – The Dalai Lama said Sunday that the U.S.-led war in Iraq could perhaps have been avoided through negotiations with Saddam Hussein.
\nResponding to a question about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the exiled leader of Tibetan Buddhists said that Hussein was “not such a foolish person. War with America. He can’t win.”
\nThe Dalai Lama has criticized the Iraq war effort in the past. He did not offer any solutions to continued violence there.
\n“Now, I don’t know,” he said.
\nThe Nobel Prize winner appeared at the Cathedral of St. John the Divine after wrapping up four days of teaching at Radio City Music Hall.
\nNearly 2,000 people, including actors Richard Gere and Naomi Watts, filled the cavernous Gothic cathedral to hear the man whom followers believe to be the reincarnation of his predecessors.
\nBilled as a panel discussion on “Kinship and its Meaning in Our World Today,” the event was more of a free-floating meditation on ecumenicism.
\nAs is his usual practice, the 74-year-old Dalai Lama smiled broadly and chuckled at his own remarks.
\n“Whether you like it or not, there are different traditions,” he said, laughing. “And no one can change that.”
\nRecalling a 2001 visit to the Roman Catholic shrine of Our Lady of Fatima in Portugal, the Dalai Lama said the statue of the Virgin Mary appeared to smile at him.
\n“Maybe, my eyes, something wrong,” he said.
\nBut he said that although he is a Buddhist, “Mary I always revere as a symbol of compassion.”
\nThe Dalai Lama dropped names of Christian leaders including Mother Teresa, South African Archbishop Desmond Tutu and the Trappist monk Thomas Merton.
\n“His boot – very big, like Army boot,” he said of Merton, who died in 1968. “His hat – very shiny.”
\nJoining the Dalai Lama on the panel were two Muslims, American Eboo Patel, a member of the Obama administration’s Faith Advisory Council, and Sakena Yacoobi, executive director of the Afghan Institute of Learning, which provides education and health care in Afghanistan.
\nPatel, the founder of the Chicago-based Interfaith Youth Core, said, “I think one of the great questions of our era is this: Is religion going to be a barrier of division? Is it going to be a bomb of destruction? Or is it going to be a bridge of cooperation?”
\nHe called the Dalai Lama “perhaps the greatest world leader, the most beloved global citizen, shining a light on the issue of religion as a bridge of cooperation.”
\nThe Tibetan leader has a new book, “Toward a True Kinship of Faiths: How the World’s Religions Can Come Together,” released this month in the U.S. by Doubleday Religion.
\nAssociated Press – May 23, 2010
\nCopyright 2010 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

NEW YORK – The Dalai Lama said Sunday that the U.S.-led war in Iraq could perhaps have been avoided through negotiations with Saddam Hussein. Responding to a question about the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, the exiled leader of Tibetan Buddhists said that Hussein was “not such a foolish person. War with America. 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A New Yorker by birth but a Floridian by tenure, Nicole graduated from Florida A&M University with a B.S. in Public Relations and a minor in Sociology. She moved to NY to pursue a career in journalism which started at In Style magazine. There she learned the ropes of magazine reporting, researching, and writing\u00e2\u20ac\u201dand became exponentially more stylish. But what seemed like a deep interest in fashion and entertainment would soon be revealed as merely the vehicle that moved her closer to discovering her purpose, writing and covering matters of the Christian faith. While in her purpose-driven vehicle she can be found traveling between Brooklyn, Manhattan and Queens for life, work and worship, respectively. From fashion to faith and the journey isn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t over yet\u00e2\u20ac\u00a6","url":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/author\/nsymmonds"}]}},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2215","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/43"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=2215"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2215\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=2215"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=2215"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.beliefnet.com\/columnists\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=2215"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}