Thousands attend Dalai Lama's speech at U of M

Dalai Lama
The Dalai Lama, Tibetan spiritual leader, leads a Tibetan cultural and spiritual ceremony promoting personal and societal healing Sunday, May 8, 2011, at Mariucci Arena on the University of Minnesota campus in Minneapolis.
AP Photo/Jim Mone

Several thousand people attended a speech by the Dalai Lama Sunday at Mariucci Arena on the University of Minnesota's Minneapolis campus.

University President Robert Bruininks bestowed a doctorate of humane letters on the Dalai Lama before the speech by the Buddhist leader.

Bruininks also gave the Dalai Lama a Golden Gophers visor, which the Tibetan wore during his address.

The Dalai Lama spoke about achieving world peace through inner peace, which he said begins with individual warm-heartedness.

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"Act honestly, truthfully. That brings trust. Trust brings friendship. Friendship brings genuine harmony, cooperation," he said.

The Dalai Lama told his audience that people in Minnesota always show him "genuine warmth and human feeling."

He also paid tribute to mothers as the source of affection and warmth in their children.

"By nature we all have the potenial [for] warmheartedness because we all come from our mother," he said. "We've grown up under mother's tremendous affection. We all have the same experience. That's very very important."