Thoughts On Our Convictions

Thanks for sharing in our Twentieth Anniversary year. This section features short reflections on our core convictions contributed by diverse scholars from our Ikeda Center community. As with all our work, we encourage individuals to provide their unique perspectives on values and principles that flow out of Buddhism and are universal in scope and applicability.

Joseph Nye: Beyond Cultures of Command

Former Dean of the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University Joseph Nye talks about how "soft power" connects with the global need for more and greater dialogue (conviction one).
Read »

Gonzalo Obelleiro: Dialogue for Vulnerability, Justice

Gonzalo Obelleiro of Teachers College, Columbia University, discusses two complementary forms of dialogue, i.e., dialogue for vulnerability and dialogue for justice (conviction one).
Read »

Ved Nanda: Dialogue Above All

University of Denver professor of international law Ved Nanda, says that humanitarian crises in places such as Syria make the dire cost of seeking to settle conflicts (conviction one).
Read »

Larry Hickman: Aspiration Toward the Good & Valuable

In this reflection, Larry Hickman of the Center for Dewey Studies explores the transformative powers and potential shared by "the religious" and "the educative" (conviction two).
Read »

Jason Goulah: Human Education as the Means and Goal of Life

Jason Goulah of DePaul University explores Daisaku Ikeda's belief that each of us should continually develop the qualities that make us human, especially courage, wisdom, and compassion (conviction two).
Read »

Sarah Wider: Learning's Most Powerful Foundation

Sarah Ann Wider is Professor of English and Women's Studies at Colgate University. Here, she reflects on ways that she nurtures humanistic education in her classrooms (conviction two).
Read »

Elise Boulding: What Exists Is Possible

Peace scholar and organizer Elise Boulding reminds us that widespread peace cultures of the future will build upon the already existing peace cultures of today (conviction three).
Read »

Megan Laverty: The Moral Import of How We Speak

Megan Laverty of Teachers College, Columbia University, says that maintaining our faith in people’s potential for goodness involves using ordinary words as instruments of learning. (conviction three).
Read »

Anita Patterson: Emerson & Life's Inherent Dignity

Boston University's Anita Patterson explores how Emerson's ideas on education and human dignity pertain in an age when schooling is shaped by the needs of the market economy (conviction four).
Read »

Joel Myerson: Never to Cease Our Striving

Scholar of the American Renaissance Joel Myerson reflects on the capacity of individuals to continuously transform themselves and our world for the better (conviction five).
Read »

Jim Garrison: A Calling Into Existence

In this reflection, Jim Garrison of Virginia Tech says the arts release "ideal possibilities hidden in the actual" through the process of poiesis; that is, "making creating, or calling into existence" (conviction six).
Read »

Mary Lee Morrison: Poetry Makes us Human

Author Mary Lee Morrison argues that poetry and peace education are united in evoking our imagination "toward the deepest possibilities for human existence" (conviction six).
Read »

Stephen Gould: Greater Than the Sum of Their Parts

Lesley University's Stephen Gould considers the seven convictions as a cohesive, interdependent whole, and wonders how widespread practice of them would change our world (conviction seven).
Read »

John Berthrong: Harmony Without Uniformity

John Berthrong of Boston University's School of Theology says that contemporary Chinese thinkers are encouraged by the Confucian idea that social harmony doesn't require uniformity (conviction seven).
Read »

Lou Marinoff: Admirable and Achievable

Lou Marinoff is Professor and Chair of Philosophy at The City College of New York. Here, he discusses dialogue, humanistic education, reform of self, and interdependence (convictions one, two, five, and seven).
Read »

Bernice Lerner: Learning From Those No Longer With Us

Bernice Lerner of Hebrew College reflects on dialogue and people's potential for good. It is our task to pursue dialogue recognize the good that's present in our world  (convictions one and three).
Read »

Ann Diller: Deep Listening

Ann Diller is Professor Emerita, Philosophy of Education, University of New Hamphire. She shares a poem to help us listen beyond words to deeper meaning (convictions one and six).
Read »