TIM BOYD currently serves as president of the Theosophical Society in America. He was born in New York City in 1953 and lived there for seventeen years until he went away to college at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island. He later transferred to the University of Chicago, where he was an honors graduate with a Bachelor of Arts degree in Public Affairs.

In Chicago Tim was first introduced to Theosophy and the Theosophical Society through Bill Lawrence, a TS member who was a mentor for many young people in the area. Tim joined the TSA in 1974. With Bill and others he founded a Theosophical spiritual community in Chicago's inner city. The group held classes on the Ageless Wisdom, meditation, and healing. They worked with at-risk and disadvantaged youth, transformed vacant lots into award-winning organic food gardens, and placed beehives on the roofs of local buildings. They formed a business that initially focused on reclaiming and renovating some of the deteriorating residential buildings in their area. In time, the business was formalized as Royal Associates and developed residential buildings for low- and middle-income families. The organization's work helped stabilize neighborhoods through the training and employment of local youth and the creation of affordable homes for area residents. Tim was a managing partner in the business.

Tim has been involved in Theosophical work at all levels: as a lodge member, founder of a study center, a member of the TSA national board of directors, TSA vice-president, and now president. In 1988 TSA president Dorothy Abbenhouse asked him to serve as a national lecturer. Since that time he has spoken across the USA and on every continent except Africa and Australia. His articles have been translated into several languages and have appeared in Theosophical journals around the world. From 1996 to 2000 he worked in hospice services as a volunteer in a team that involved doctors, social workers, and nurses.  In 2007 he became president of the Theosophical Order of Service USA. One of his first projects as president involved an international fund-raising effort for a challenge grant to aid the Golden Link School in the Philippines. With the aid of TOS sections worldwide, they were able to substantially exceed the matching grant.

Tim's involvement with the Theosophical Order of Service and the Chushul orphanage in Tibet led to an audience with the Dalai Lama, which resulted in the TSA sponsoring his visit to Chicago in July of 2011 - a two-day event attended by ten thousand people. The event raised $400,000, all of which was donated to educational projects aiding Tibetan communities worldwide.

Tim lives at the Olcott national center in Wheaton, Illinois, with his wife, Lily, and daughter, Angelique, when she is home from college.


ABOUT THE THEOSOPHICAL SOCIETY
The Theosophical Society in America is a membership organization, branch of a world fellowship--the International Theosophical Society with headquarters in Adyar, Chennai, India.

The Society is composed of students belonging to any religion or to none. Its members are united by their approval of the Society's Three Objects, by their wish to remove religious antagonisms and to draw together people of goodwill whatsoever their religious opinions, and by their desire to study religious truths and to share the results of their studies with others. Their bond of union is not the profession of a common belief, but a common search and aspiration for Truth.

In accordance with the Theosophical spirit, most Theosophists regard Truth as a prize to be striven for, not as a dogma to be imposed by authority. They hold that belief should be the result of individual understanding and intuition rather than mere acceptance of traditional ideas, and that it should rest on knowledge and experience, not on assertion. Truth should therefore be sought by study, reflection, meditation, service, purity of life, and devotion to high ideals.

At the same time, Theosophists respect the different beliefs. They see each religion as an expression of the Divine Wisdom, adapted to the needs of a particular time and place. They prefer the study of various religions to their condemnation, their practice to proselytism. Thus, earnest Theosophists extend tolerance to all, even to the intolerant, not as a privilege they bestow but as a duty they perform. They seek to remove ignorance, not punish it; peace is their watchword, and Truth their aim.

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The Society is dedicated to promoting the unity of humanity; to foster religious and racial understanding by encouraging the study of religion, philosophy and science; and to further the discovery of the spiritual aspect of life and of human beings. The Society stands for a complete freedom of individual search and belief, while promoting in its members a willingness to examine any concept and belief with an open mind, and a respect for other people's understanding.


The Theosophical Society in America . . .

Has a Vision of wholeness that inspires a fellowship united in study, meditation, and service.
 
Its Mission is to encourage open-minded inquiry into world religions, philosophy, science, and the arts in order to understand the wisdom of the ages, respect the unity of all life, and help people explore spiritual self-transformation.
 
Its Ethic holds that our every action, feeling, and thought affects all other beings and that each of us is capable of and responsible for contributing to the benefit of the whole.