The Norwich Younger Sangha is changing...

How?

The name will change to Norwich Young Buddhists.
The Big Monthly Gathering will now have two aspects to it:
1. A peer led exploration of applied Buddhist practice, suitable for Centre regulars who've completed a beginners Buddhism course.
2. A new Buddhism and meditation drop in class, suitable for newcomers and those who haven't completed a beginners Buddhism course.
The upper age limit will become 35 instead of 40.

Why?

We've grown and we keep growing. When we first started there were very few of us beneath the age of 40 attending the Norwich centre, so about four years ago the Norwich Younger Sangha was set up by those of us who wanted more peer friendship. The age range was broad (under 40s) as there were so few of us. At first a small handful of people would come together for a picnic or a bike ride, but not much more than this.

All this continued for a while until around 2 ½ years ago, whensomething magical started to happen... Our numbers began to grow and grow. At first everyone was very new and at a similar level of experience, but this has also changed. Now we have a full programme of Dharma activities; our Big Monthly Gathering regularly attracts 20 – 35 people; we have an incredibly broad range of experience, from people attending the Centre for the first time, to those training for Ordination. Our energy, idealism and engagement has enriched and galvanised the life of the Buddhist Centre.

We want to meet and embrace this change, we want this precious context to be as accessible and as relevant as possible, we want to offer it to more people, so they can benefit as we have done. We want to take what we're doing to the next level, we want to broaden and deepen this living revolution, and we invite you to be a part of it.

So we're changing our name because few other than practising Buddhists know that Sangha means spiritual community, we want our name to be more accessible. Of course, you don't have to be a Buddhist to join in, just interested and curious.
We're changing the experience levels to meet the spiritual needs of our ever growing Big Monthly Gatherings.
We're changing the age range to deepen the sense of engaging with similar life issues and building peer friendships.