Lectures and Performances

Steve Hagen,
Dharma Field Center
Minneapolis, MN
http://www.dharmafield.org/

Steve Hagen has been a student of Buddhist thought and practice since 1967. In 1975 he became a student of Dainin Katagiri Roshi, founding Abbot of the Minnesota Zen Center in Minneapolis, and was ordained in 1979.  He has studied with teachers in the U.S., Asia, and Europe, and in 1989 received transmission (endorsement to teach) from Katagiri Roshi, an important figure in helping bring Zen Buddhism from Japan to the United States during its formative years-especially to the American Midwest.  He is currently head teacher at Dharma Field.   Hagen is the author of Meditation Now or Never (2007), Buddhism Is Not What You Think (2003), Buddhism Plain and Simple (1997), and the editor of You Have to Say Something: Manifesting Zen Insight, a collection of Dharma talks by Dainin Katagiri (1998).

Rev. Chandana Karuna
International Buddhist Meditation Center
Los Angeles, CA
http://www.ibmc.info/

Rev. Chandana Karuna stepped onto the Buddhist path in 1963, practicing and studying alone and with various teachers.  In 1983, she began to work with Venerable Karuna Dharma at the International Buddhist Meditation Center in Los Angeles, where she was fully ordained in 2008 in the Vietnamese Lam Te (Rinzai) Zen tradition under the name of Thich Tam Hu'o'ng.  She is currently a disciple of Roshi Thich An Giao, Abbot of Chua Vietnam (desertzencenter.org) in Lucerne Valley, California.  Devoted to meditation and peacemaking, she is a member of the Buddhist Peace Fellowship and Sakyadhita: the International Association of Buddhist Women.