Greater Boston Buddhist Community Census

Presented to His Holiness The Dalai Lama

May 2012

For as long as space endures
and as long as sentient beings remain
May I too abide
to dispel the miseries of the world.

-Shantideva

OVERVIEW

This census is happily offered in response to a request from the office of His Holiness the Dalai Lama in preparation for his visit to the Kurukulla Center in October of 2012.

Abstract

The findings of this census of Buddhists in the Greater Boston area are in line with the national estimate that 0.7% percent of the US population is Buddhist. Middlesex County, one of 3 counties above the national rate, has the highest percentage at 1.35%, almost twice the national mark.

33,095 Buddhists were counted as being active or associated with the Buddhist Sanghas queried in this survey. About 18% of those counted in the survey are actively involved in Sangha activities on a weekly basis.

Of the 74 Sanghas identified, 16 did not respond or declined to participate in the census. More than half of the communities are English speaking, but there are significant Khmer, Chinese and Vietnamese speaking communities in Massachusetts.

Vipassana/Theravada traditions appear in the greatest number, followed by the Tibetan and Vietnamese traditions.

Methodology

Research was conducted by a team of nine volunteers in several stages using the following methodology:

• Scope of Data Collection – A committee was formed and the scope and definition of data was determined.  Data was collected by Sangha. The following data elements were determined in scope
  • Tradition
  • Type of Center
  • Primary Language
  • Active Community
  • Total Community

• Identification of Sanghas in the greater Boston Area – primarily drawing on sources found on the world wide web, Sanghas were identified and contact information was collected for Sanghas that met in the following Counties
  • Massachusetts
    
    • Essex
    • Middlesex
    • Norfolk
    • Plymouth
    • Suffolk
• New Hampshire
  • Rockingham
  • Stratford

 

• Contact with Sanghas – Volunteers were then engaged at the County and Sangha level to establish contact with Sangha leaders and to collect data

• Summary – Once data was collected this report was created to categorize and summarize the data in the context of a number of other regional variables

Sanghas in Greater Boston

We discovered and contacted 74 Sanghas in the Greater Boston Area.  The image below depicts the towns in which Sanghas exist.  There are several towns, for example Boston and Cambridge, which have multiple groups.

Massachusetts Sanghas

Town	Sangha Name
Allston	Soka Gakkai International (SGI)
Arlington	Arlington Meditation Group
Arlington	Arlington Street Zen Center and Buddha’s Belly Book group
Arlington	Drikung Meditation Center
Arlington	Jokhang Institute
Arlington	Tara Sadhana Group
Arlington	The Arlington Center/Insight Meditation Group
Belmont	Mountain Bell Sangha
Beverly	Vajra Vidya – Thrangu Rinpoche
Boston	Old Path Sangha
Boston	Universal Buddhist Congregation
Braintree	Bo De Buddhist Meditation Center
Braintree	Samantabhadra/Pho Hien Buddhist Center
Brighton	American Buddhist Shim Gum Do Association
Brockton	Bodhicitta Center for the Encouragement of Compassion in the World
Brookline	The Shambhala Meditation Center of Boston
Brookline	Diamond Way Buddhist Center: Boston
Cambridge	Bodhimarga Cambridge Sangha
Cambridge	Boston Buddhist Culture Center
Cambridge	Buddhist Community at MIT
Cambridge	Cambridge Insight Meditation Center
Cambridge	Cambridge UU Sitting Group
Cambridge	Cambridge Zen Center
Cambridge	Foundation for Active Compassion
Cambridge	Harvard Buddhist Community
Cambridge	Open Awareness Sangha
Cambridge	Sakya Institute for Buddhist Studies
Cambridge	Tergar Meditation Group
Chelmsford	Cambodian Buddhists
Concord	Jhamtse Buddhist Center – Thursday PM
Concord	Jhamtse Buddhist Center – Wednesday AM
Dedham	Dharmata Foundation
Framingham	New England Buddhist Vihara and Meditation Center
Haverhill	BuddhaheartUSA @ UUC of Haverhill
Hingham	Buddhist and Hindu Meeting Group at Old Ship Church Parish House
Hingham	Buddhist Sangha Meditation and Discussion at Old Ship Church Parish House
Hingham	South of Boston – Mindful Living Network
Hingham	Zen Buddhist meditation group at Old Ship Church Parish House
Jamaica Plain	Foundation for Active Compassion
Jamaica Plain	Serlingpa Buddhist Meditation Center
Lexington	Massachusetts Buddhist Association
Lowell	Glory Buddhist Temple/Banlieu Buddha Cakra
Marblehead	Marblehead Zen
Marshfield	Porcello Gallery Meditation Circle
Maynard	Clock Tower Sangha
Medford	Kurukulla Buddhist Center
Medford	Spring Hill Zen/Unitarian Universalist Church of Medford
Newbury	Newbury Insight Meditation Center
Newburyport	Meditation Group @ First Religious Society UU
Newton	Henry Thoreau Zen Sangha First Unitarian Society
North Andover	Great Pond Sangha @ UUNPoNA
Plympton	Shanti Shala
Quincy	Mass Budhi Siksa Society Thousand Buddhists Temple
Quincy	Perfect Enlightenment Buddhist Association of Massachusetts, Kuan Yin Temple
Reading	Buddhist Meditation Group @ UUCR
Revere	Wat Ratanarangsi
Rockport	Vajramudra Center, ACI – Cape Ann
Roslindale	Vietnamese Buddhist Association/Temple Vietnam
Sherborn	Jhamtse Buddhist Center
Somerville	Triratna Buddhist Community
Somerville	Won Buddhism of Boston
Stowe	Meditation Group
Sudbury	Ligmincha Bon Sangha
Wakefield	Mun Su Sa Buddhist Temple
Wakefield	Wakefield UU Meditation Practice Group
Waltham	Rigpa Boston
Watertown	Hôun-an, Dharma Cloud Hermitage* Opted Out
Wellesley	Wellesley College Buddhist Community
Woburn	Soka Gakkai International (SGI)
Woburn	Woburn Aikikai

New Hampshire Sanghas

Town	Sangha Name
Barrington	Barrington Zen Center
Lee	Seacoast N.H. Meditation Group
Newmarket	Triratna Buddhist Community
Windham	Southern New Hampshire Sangha

Data by County

As pointed out in the abstract, Middlesex County had twice the percentage of Buddhist than the national average.

The bar graph below gives a sense of how the counted populations compared across counties. If one were to presume that the counties scoring below the national 0.7% mark were not counted because a Sangha was not convenient to them, then these counties could be defined as underserved and under counted.

Census by Town

The following map displays the concentration of active Buddhists throughout the greater Boston Area.  The larger the red dot, the higher the number of Buddhists in that area.

Concentration by County

This map provides a slightly different view of the concentration of active Buddhists in the Greater Boston Area.  Middlesex County has the highest concentration with Norfolk and Suffolk right behind.

It’s interesting to note that the concentration of Buddhists does not coincide with the more populated areas.  While the City of Boston probably has the largest population, its county, Suffolk County, does not have the highest concentration of Buddhists.

Percentage of Buddhists in Greater Boston Compared to the Nation

According to Wikipedia (Wikipedia, 2012) the percent of the US population who are Buddhists is 0.7%.  Middlesex, Norfolk, and Rockingham Counties show numbers ahead of the national average

The following graph shows how each county (in blue) compares to the national 0.7% percentage (in orange)

Language

A significant majority of Buddhist Sanghas and their members’ primary language is English, but there are significant numbers of Khmer, Vietnamese, and other Asian language communities.

Tradition

This first graph shows how the major traditions in the region compare to each other

This graph shows more granular tradition data as reported by the Sanghas. For example this graph separates out various Tibetan traditions.

Here is a more granular view of the traditions as they are dispersed throughout the counties of Greater Boston.

Acknowledgements

The Kurukulla Canter is grateful to the following volunteers who made this census possible

• Barbara Arsnow
• Caren Cowie
• Ken Flanders
• Andrew Furst
• Mimi Izzo
• Alison Landoni
• Matthew McCall
• Joan Schwartz
• Bill Seaver