Continuing our Triratna News mini-series marking the COP21 climate change talks in Paris, more news of climate change actions from around the Triratna world.
Dublin Buddhist Centre, in Ireland, released their Statement on Human-Caused Global Warming today. Last week, we hear, Triratna individuals were among those staging a ritual inside the British Museum, as part of the Art, not Oil coalition’s opposition to BP’s (British Petroleum) sponsorship of several British arts institutions.
And what of the marches? Steph Delaney writes from the London Buddhist Centre: “50,000 people, including members of Triratna, marched across London, in the largest of about 2,500 demonstrations taking place around the world. People from Triratna’s London, Cambridge, Oxford, Surrey, Kent and Birmingham sanghas met in Hyde Park, and joined a group meditation organised by DANCE (Dharma Action Network for Climate Engagement, who also took part in the Art, not Oil actions) and Wake Up London, to mark the start of the march.
From Ireland, Lisa Patten reports: “Approximately 35 people from the Dublin Buddhist Centre went to the Dublin climate march with our recently-made banner and colourful peacocks symbolising the transformation of poison into beauty.
Ratnavyuha adds, from New Zealand: “There were 28 of us from the Auckland Buddhist Centre at the climate march in Auckland on Saturday 28th November. Akasamati organised a team of people making banners and. The NZ Herald reported 15,000 people attended and there was a great atmosphere of care and consideration.”
Lisa writes, “Climate change will cause unimaginable suffering to all forms of life on planet earth if it is not tackled. As Buddhists, together with hundreds of thousands around the world, we were marching to raise awareness that ‘Actions have Co2nsequences’.
The London gathering was co-ordinated by a group called Transforming Self and World, based at the London Buddhist Centre. Steph writes: “The group was established earlier this year by Mitras and Order members dedicated to making social action a greater part of their Buddhist practice.” Read Steph’s full report on the LBC march, over on the Compassion in Action space here on TBCO.
Email contacts for Transforming Self and World: tesshorvath [at] gmail.com (Tessa Horvath) and stephadel [at] hotmail.com (Steph Delaney. )
stephadel [at] hotmail.com (Follow Transforming Self and World on Facebook.)
+Follow Buddhist Action Month next June on The Buddhist Centre Online.
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This is a very interesting development and not necessarily for all the right reasons. Whilst I loathe the desecration of nature (ocean pollution and the destruction of the rain forests make me weep inwardly), I am not at all convinced about AGW. Contrary to what the essentially Leftist world view would have us believe, the science is simply NOT definitive as it stands. Conversely, I am inclined to attribute the alarmism of the AGW brigade to a species of “the-end-of-the-world-is-nigh”-ism which is historically recurrent in human nature itself - mainly as a bi-product of unconscious guilt which then flagellates itself. I may be proven wrong. I may not. What I do slightly resent though is the assumption that all nature lovers and all Buddhists must be pro the AGW brigade, This is both wrong and rude, and as such not very Buddhist actually.