FREE WEBCAST Thursday, September 23, 7:00 p.m. CDT

In the Buddhist cycle of existence, the realm of hungry ghosts is one of the unfortunate realms of rebirth, and those reborn there are often described as having enormous stomachs and tiny mouths, forever thwarted in their search for food. But hungry ghosts know the error of their ways, and they sometimes appear among humans — like the ghosts that haunt Ebenezer Scrooge — as augurs of what may await. Humans, they know, have a tendency to cultivate meanness (mātsarya), which makes those people cruel, immoral, and oblivious to their own self-righteousness. That meanness can lead to madness and misery. Thankfully, hungry ghosts offer unique insight into the human condition, and can provide us with the solution to this problem.