this has been a particularly busy and interesting time for my work in the liaison office.  it has seemed to me, in a number of different meetings, like buddhist getting beyond the getting-to-know-each-other stage, and beginning to practically, tentatively, co-operate. in the pages that follow, i’ll write up some of the events of the last few months in a bit more detail. but first a bit of a summary:

it began at the beginning of august with a visit to dagpo kagyu ling, a kagyu monastic centre in the auvergne to find out more about their three year retreat programme; i squeezed in the glasgow sangha retreat at the end of august before coming back to madhyamaloka in early september for an fwbo central meeting, dealing with the changing role of madhyamaloka;  the following weekend the ‘buddhist healthcare chaplaincy group’ met at madhyamaloka, a number of buddhist groups trying to work co-operatively and to agree a set of training standards and assessment criteria that the health service can use to appoint buddhist chaplains.

in mid-september i attended a conference in london on the work of dr ambedkar.

the conference was timed to mark the 50th anniversary of the 1956 mass conversions to buddhism initiated by dr ambedkar in India in 1956, and was co-organised by karuna and the network of buddhist organisations. the purpose of the conference was to let british buddhists know about the work of dr. ambedkar, and more specifically to involve other buddhists in the massive need for dharma teaching among the new buddhists in India.

the following monday i gave a talk on bereavement at the london buddhist centre ‘challenging times’ series. for the rest of the week we hosted lamas lhundrup and djanchub from dagpo kagu ling at madhyamaloka, for subhuti’s seminar on ambedkar’s work.

at the end of september i visited bristol at the invitation of the bristol chan group, to teach a weekend on the brahma viharas. on the 26th i was in cambridge, to meet with padmavajra and padmasuri, to plan the november preceptor’s college meeting.

on the 28th i flew to barcelona for the agm of the european buddhist union and the ‘meeting of buddhist teachers in europe’, which ended on october 4. the ebu was another gathering that produced a promising co-operative initiative: this time a proposal for a europe wide academic training in buddhist studies, an idea which seems to have cross tradition support.

on october 7, i was at taplow court, the elizabethan headquarters of sokka gakai, for a meeting of the network of buddhist organisations, and on the 8th i flew to bombay, for a meeting with lokamitra and the indian public preceptors. that’s where i’m writing this now.

photo: temple detail, le bost, dagpo kagyu mandala