Today, we are called to respond to our suffering world, to the enormity of the challenges facing humankind and the Earth. We are organizing ourselves mindfully and deliberately to help heal, protect, preserve, and nourish the Earth and all beings, as best we can, as part of a vast global “movement of movements.” This is a continuation of the Buddhist Bodhisattva path of working for the well-being of all life, of using the fruits of meditation like solidity, peacefulness, compassion, inclusiveness, and joy to relieve suffering in the wide world.
The Beloved Community Circles network is one concrete manifestation of this path. An individual Beloved Community Circle is composed of 3-12 practitioners who form a small, local mindful action team who feel called to integrate:
Mindfulness Practice—by practicing basic mindfulness together toward personal transformation of suffering.
Community Building—by caring for one another in the Circle, attending to the well-being of the group itself, and forming a mini-Beloved Community.
Collective Action —by committing to a specific number of days a year of mindful action at the nexus of racial and environmental justice (suggested range is 12-20 days per year, but determined by local Circle conditions).
This handbook lays out the “DNA” of the Beloved Community Circles network: foundational beliefs and framing principles; an overview of the purpose, commitments, structure of a Circle and of the network; practices that support each of the three commitments above; and selected resources.
Plum Village Tradition and the Beloved Community
The Beloved Community is a notion often associated with Martin Luther King, Jr. He put a strong public spotlight on an idea that has been held deep in the hearts of humans for millennia. People everywhere have had the yearning to live in a peaceful, harmonious, and sustainable world. Indigenous people, as best they could, have lived according to this idea. Utopian thinkers through the ages have created versions of this very human aspiration. Enlightened spiritual teachers have pointed the way.
The name “Beloved Community” is credited to a Christian theologian, Josiah Royce, in 1913 in a book called The Problem of Christianity. He conceived of it as a community based in love and essential interconnectedness. Then, a series of successive directors of the venerable peace organization called Fellowship of Reconciliation carried the name forward. A.J. Muste added nonviolence as essential. Howard Thurman added the need for community. Thurman passed the idea to Dr. King who embraced it and made it a cornerstone of the U.S. Civil Rights Movement. King introduced Thich Nhat Hanh to the term (though not the idea, since he had reached his own interpretation of this human aspiration long before he met Dr. King), who upon hearing of King’s death, made a vow to try his best to continue building the Beloved Community. However, none of these spiritual leaders, Christian or Buddhist, invented the idea of beloved community, an idea which is an ancient human longing.
Many people mistakenly think that the Beloved Community is made up of folks like us – – “our” kind, “our” people, “our'' kindred spirits, “our” special group. This is a much too narrow definition. Dr. King, Thich Nhat Hanh, and many others who have contributed to the modern idea of the Beloved Community, grounded in their respective spiritual traditions, envisioned it as the manifestation of the way Love or God or the Divine or Buddha-nature shows up in the material world. On a spiritual level, the Beloved Community is the “Kingdom of God on earth.” One could say that it is already in existence, that is, as the bedrock of reality. Thich Nhat Hanh might say that the Beloved Community is alive and whole in the ultimate dimension. It’s the deeper truth of our interconnectedness. Thay coined the term “interbeing” as one expression of this truth.
Because this primal ground of our interbeing is often obscured by hurt, wrong perception, mis-education, oppression and other challenges, we often forget our essential connectedness. We wind up divided and disunited, cut off from each other and nature, and hurting each other and the earth as a result.
In this historical dimension where we live and breathe, the Beloved Community is an aspiration that reminds us of our inextricable connection to all things. Our task is to realize this truth in its fullness. The Beloved Community lives in harmony, love, and compassion. This community, or sangha, excludes no one and sees no enemies. It is a space where everyone belongs, where conflicts are resolved peacefully, where trauma and hurt are healed, where there is deep shared commitment to dismantling oppression and racism, and to the common good of all. The sacred and vast unknown are honored and held in reverence. As an aspiration, it is “the more beautiful world our hearts know is possible,” to use the lovely phrasing of writer Charles Eisenstein.
Given this understanding of the Beloved Community as both the truth of our relatedness and a deep aspiration to manifest this truth, Thich Nhat Hanh and the Plum Village Tradition sit squarely in a long lineage. Thay’s vow to build the Beloved Community has evolved into a world-wide community of a dozen or so practice centers supporting thousands of local sanghas that serve tens of thousands of practitioners. The Beloved Community Circles idea is one more way of intentionally nurturing this aspiration.
Origins, Acknowledgements, and Gratitude
The Beloved Community Circles initiative and this handbook emerged from a host of causes and conditions which we wish to acknowledge at the outset. First, we offer deep gratitude for the teachings of the Buddha and to Venerable Thich Nhat Hanh who interpreted those teachings and developed practices for the modern world. Deep gratitude for the global monastic community which has tried its best to model the Beloved Community in the practice centers. We honor and have been inspired by the various Plum Village initiatives—ARISE, Earth Holder Community, Wake Up, EMBRACE, the Lotus Institute, Wake Up Schools, Chrysanthemum Sangha and others that have helped bring greater awareness of social equity, inclusion, and world issues to the community.
While acknowledging our roots, we also are not a religious organization, nor a Buddhist one. People of all backgrounds, faith and humanist traditions are most welcome to become Beloved Community Circles, as long as they are aligned with the core principles and practices outlined in this handbook.
We also acknowledge that this effort stands on the shoulders of individuals and organizations around the world and down through history that have dedicated their lives to well-being and liberation from suffering of all beings. We are in the stream of their continuation and pledge to honor their legacies.
The Beloved Community Circles project acknowledges and thanks specific individuals for their part in developing the project. John Bell, in partnership with Sr. True Vow/The Nghiem, while on the Earth Holder Community Care Taking Council, drafted the original proposal. They met with Kazu Haga and Chris Moore-Backman, who have developed a sibling initiative called the Fierce Vulnerability Network. Kazu and Chris generously read the initial materials and the early draft of this handbook, and gave us permission to use sections of their excellent handbook. Their solidarity, support, shared vision has been invaluable.
Numerous people made key contributions to successive iterations of the Beloved Community materials: Earth Holder Community CTC members and staff Simona Coayla-Duba, Sara Henry, Chaya Ocampo Go, Shephali Patel, Stephanie Knox-Steiner, and Andrew Deckert; to Valerie Brown, Kaira Jewel Lingo, Victoria Mausisa, Meena Srinivasan, Lyn Fine, Jo Confino, Elli Weisbaum, Kenley Neufeld, Jo-ann Rosen, Anne Woods; to Heather Lyn Mann, Andrew Rock, Jeff Johnson, Keith Miller, and George Hoguet; to Sr. Hein Nghiem/True Dedication, Sr. Lang Nghiem, Br Phap Linh, and Br. Phap Luu for their support. To Judy Myerson and Nina Teng for starting the first Beloved Community Circle. To Episcopal Bishop Marc Andrus, author of "Brothers in the Beloved Community: The Friendship of Thich Nhat Hanh and Martin Luther King, Jr." for inspiring the name “Beloved Community Circles,” used with his permission. A deep bow to Melanie Gin, Ivan Trujillo-Priego, Sr. True Vow/The Nghiem, and John Bell, who formed the first iteration of the Beloved Community Circle Caretaking Council and who worked diligently and creatively to shape the foundation stones of the initiative.
This has been a collective creation, a generous offering, and, we hope, a beautiful continuation of many noble spiritual teachers down through the ages who pointed the way to the beloved community.
