Greetings,
More of Bhikkhu Bodhi's manifesto has been released.
Additional political agenda items include:
- Rescind subsidies to fossil fuel corporations
- Impose a carbon tax to ensure costs of fossil fuel extraction and pollution are built into the market price of carbon
- Reject Keystone XL pipeline and other mega-oil pipelines
- Prohibit oil trains
- Shift away from model of industrial agriculture to agro-ecological models
- Provide subsidies and low-interest loans to clean, renewable energy projects
- Promote mass production of electric and hybrid cars
- Develop better, more efficient means of public transportation
But what is really concerning here is that "to purify one's own mind" is now structured according to ecological concerns!
It seems SDC's concerns are not misplaced...
Bhikkhu Bodhi wrote:III. To purify one’s own mind
1. Develop contentment, the basis for a steady-state economy
based on the principle of sufficiency, dedicated to qualitative
growth rather than endless production and consumption
2. Utilize wisdom, to understand the long-range and long-term
consequences of our actions, rooted in the subtle
interconnections of diverse chains of causality
3. Arouse a heart of compassion, extending loving concern to all
people everywhere on earth, based on deep inner identification
and respect for human dignity
4. Advocate for justice, to establish the necessary social,
economic, and political institutions, laws, and modes of
governance that offer everyone the conditions needed to
unfold their potentials and realize their best aspirations
Is this the Buddha's Sangha or is this Oxfam? The Dhamma has been hijacked.
I find it very disappointing that we're told (by a Theravada bhikkhu no less) that the mind is to be purified though this Dhamma...
"Advocate for justice, to establish the necessary social,
economic, and political institutions, laws, and modes of
governance that offer everyone the conditions needed to
unfold their potentials and realize their best aspirations"
At what point do we stop rationalizing this perversion of the Dhamma?
Metta,
Retro.
"Whatever is true, whatever is noble, whatever is right, whatever is pure, whatever is lovely, whatever is admirable—if anything is excellent or praiseworthy—think about such things."