June is Buddhist Action Month!
Buddhist Action Month (BAM) is a festival of Buddhist social action in many forms. It started in Britain in 2012, as an initiative of the Network of Buddhist Organisations UK, but this year it’s going international, fuelled by loving kindness!

Read a short history of BAM.

Loving kindness, or metta, is the strong intention to show loving kindness for all, and it’s expressed in acting for the benefit of the world. Practising this is at the heart of everything we do in the Triratna Buddhist Community.

If you’d like to put metta into action in your world this June, click + follow above and check out our resources below.

Actions and consequences
BAM is an opportunity for more of us to act on our deepening understanding that we live in a complex, interconnected world, in which all our thoughts, feelings and actions have consequences, for us and for other living things.

Working with metta, we can learn to see through our imagined limits in order to address the sheer heat of the world's suffering (and our own), meeting it more effectively. And there's a lot in the world today that urgently needs a metta-ful response: an attentive, skilful, generous response, based in the Buddha's particular understanding of suffering, its causes, and how to end it.

Get involved! Your world needs you!

Triratna themes for Buddhist Action Month 2015
Last year BAM focussed on global warming and environmental sustainability; this year we're suggesting three themes to inspire a wider range of activities - but don't let this limit your thinking!

Sustainability
Awakening our money sense
Caring for others

Your next steps

+ Follow this BAM space on The Buddhist Centre Online to stay in touch with what's happening and learn from others. (We'll also be sharing BAM news more widely via the main Triratna Facebook group.)
Watch a video of Mokshini's talk: 'Altruism - Actually getting out and doing something'.
Read the document Dharmic reasons to take part in BAM.
Look at the BAM Event planning guide.
Look at the BAM Suggested actions guide.
Use the BAM resources tab on this BAM space to find other resources easily.
Talk to your friends and decide what to do.

Going further
Go beyond BAM and join the Compassion In Action group. (Buddhist social action is not just for June!)

Other resources

Read and listen to the Karaniya Metta sutta, the Buddha's advice on loving kindness (metta).
Check out Sheffield Buddhist Centre's Karaniya metta kula.
Follow what other UK Buddhist traditions are doing for BAM, on Facebook.

View the BAM 2014 archive.

related themes

related themes