On the evening of Tuesday, May 23, the day of the school shooting in Uvalde, Texas, that killed nineteen children and two adults, bhikkhuni Ayya Dhammadipa, founder of Dassanaya Buddhist Community in Alexandria, Virginia, live-streamed a dharma talk that confronts the horror of this massacre and the 27 school shootings that have happened in the United States so far this year. Also acknowledging the racist mass shooting in Buffalo, New York that occurred just ten days prior, Ayya Dhammapida discusses what the dharma can teach us about understanding these shootings, focusing on the impact of a sense of separation, which, when it becomes hardened and painful, leads to a dehumanization of others.
School shootings and the sense of disconnection from dana elliott on Vimeo.
This dharma talk originally appeared here on the Dassanaya Buddhist Community’s website.