Dharma Activism

with Andy Wistreich

This is the first in a series of three online Friday evening talks exploring how we combine buddhist practice with activism:

• Dharma Activism: a talk with Andy Wistreich – 24th Jan
• A Bodhisattva’s response to the planetary crisis - 21st February
• A Tantric Yogi’s response to the planetary crisis - 14th March (This talk is for Buddhist practitioners who have a Highest Yoga Tantra empowerment only)

These talks are organized by our sister FPMT center in Leeds, UK. 

In Dharma Activism we will explore together:

• Inner and outer activism and the relationship between the two
• Activism as virtuous karma
• Compassion and nonviolence in activist ethics
• Benefits of Dharma practice such as meditation for activists

“I have decided to offer these three talks in order to help others to explore ways to connect Dharma practice to the world situation. I feel that it is our responsibility to find our personal way to contribute to the transformations that need to take place in order to create a future worth living in for ourselves and our descendants.” – Andy Wistreich

About Andy’s journey into activism

“In 2006 I was sent an article from New Scientist reviewing James Lovelock’s book The Revenge of Gaia. I hadn’t ever considered myself an environmentalist but had taken nature for granted. What moved me in the article was the projection for an increase of four degrees in the world’s average temperature above pre-industrial levels. There was a world map depicting this, a copy of which now sits on my desk to regularly remind me. Agriculture will become impossible in most of the world.

I had been working at the bodhisattva path for about a quarter of a century. The thought came to me, ‘How can you wish to save all sentient beings from suffering and ignore this?’ I began to bring this issue into my daily meditation practice. It was a reawakening of my engagement with the world.

Since my twenties when I got disillusioned with social transformation through the failure of the revolutionary path I’d followed for seven years, I took a nosedive into inner work, and found Buddha Dharma. With my reawakening in 2006, Dharma and activism started to come together in my consciousness. It was in February 2019, with the emergence of Extinction Rebellion, that this again translated into action on the streets when I participated in a meditation outside Barclays Bank to protest at their funding of fossil fuels’ extraction. Later that year I joined XR Buddhists, and have been with them ever since.

I went on a journey of reeducation, reading extensively around the causes and possible solutions for the planetary crisis.  I have become actively involved with an international forum called Deep Transformation Network, where the roots of the metacrisis in human consciousness are discussed and explored extensively, and certain online group practices are hosted. I was most pleased when Jamyang London organised the Planetary Crisis Summit in April 2024, as I discuss in this blog article Dharma + Activism: responding to the planetary crisis with compassion and wisdom  – Jamyang London Buddhist Centre.”

Practical information

When: Friday Jan 24th from 20.00-22.00 hrs CET

For whom: Anyone curious about buddhism and activism

Location: online only via Zoom

Registration & donation: These can be found on the Jamyang Leeds website