Bhikkhu Bodhi on the recent gathering in Washington

[mikenz66]

Buddhists at the White House

It might be interesting to collect some of the suttas that refer to such things:

The day’s events concluded with a short talk by Jack Kornfield, who gave
voice to the shared recognition that this day marked a significant step
forward for Buddhism on American soil. Jack pointed out that in coming
together to articulate our common concerns to see Buddhist values taken
as guideposts for public policy, Buddhists were not breaking new ground
but were continuing a tradition that goes back to the Buddha himself,
who traveled through northeast India advising kings, princes, governors,
and citizens how to establish a rule that conforms to the Dharma, the
timeless law of goodness, truth, and justice. As Buddhists we do not
seek to impose our religious beliefs on government, a violation of the
separation of church and state, but to see that government policies
conform to the standards of compassion, social equity, peace, and
environmental responsibility at the heart of Buddhism and all the
world’s great faith traditions.

This would include several of those in Chapter IV of In the Buddha’s Words:

In the Buddha’s Words

Note: This post is reproduced from Dhamma Wheel. This post gives links to freely-available versions of the suttas included in Bhikkhu Bodhi’s book. More details of this excellent book, and the Introduction for each chapter, are available at Wisdom Publications. You can read some of it at Amazon and Google Books. Note that there are talks by Bhikkhu Bodhi, based on this book, here (you will need to scroll down to find them). There are bound to be errors in the links. Please report them! EDIT:…

[mikenz66]

Bhante, Thank you for your comment here:

Exploring Meaning – multi-faith climate change workshop

[Shivam]

Thanks for sharing. And here is, Bhante Sujato recent essay on ‘Monks and politics’

http://buddhistchannel.tv/index.php?id=8%2C12328%2C0%2C0%2C1%2C0#.VWpyF8u6bqC