Background
Karuna Dharma was born Joyce Adele Pettingill on April 21, 1940 in Beloit, Wisconsin to a Baptist family.
Karuna Dharma was born Joyce Adele Pettingill on April 21, 1940 in Beloit, Wisconsin to a Baptist family.
She attended the University of Wisconsin–Madison where she met Ben Ting Fun Lum.
She was one of his first students. She took full ordination in the Lieu Quang school of Vietnamese Thiền from Thích Thiên-Ân in 1976. Dharma interpreted the Prātimokṣa"s prohibition on sexual misconduct as not applying to people in a committed relationship.
She estimated at one point that one third of the community at IBMC was lesbian or gay.
She had two daughters, Chrystine and Elan. Dharma died on February 22, 2014.
