Tag: 120-years

Unique UK Fotball League - Bristol

England: The 120-Year-Old Bristol Downs Football League – Every Game a “Home” Match! (7.11.2024)

How many football leagues can count a former England cricket idol, an England football captain, an EFL referee, and a serving councillor among its past and present players?

Dating back almost 120 years, the Bristol Downs League, in many ways, is just like every other amateur Saturday afternoon league played up and down the country.

But it is unique in that all four divisions play on the same set of pitches at 14:00 every Saturday afternoon. Every game is a home game.

The sprawling 442-acre open parkland of the Clifton Downs on top of the city’s Avon Gorge hosts 41 teams, more than 1,500 players, and over 400 matches a season.

BBC Radio Bristol spent the 2023-24 campaign there to find out about the people, players, officials and teams that make the league so special and part of the sporting fabric of the city.

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Venerable Old Master Xu Yun [虚云]: No Difference Between a Monk and a Lay-Person! (14.10.2023)

For instance, by cross-referencing the below May 1955 Dharma-Talk with the text of ‘Empty Cloud’ for that year – a more all-round picture can be built of exactly what was happening and how Master Xu Yun was reacting to it. To be clear, Master Xu Yun was adamant that an ordained Buddhist monastic must follow ALL the rules of the Vinaya Discipline and that a lay-person must follow a least five, eight or ten of the basic vows contained in the Vinaya Discipline. This is a practical distinction Master Xu Yun upheld – as he rejected the Japanese Zen tradition of monks being allowed to eat meat, drink alcohol and get married. Such individuals are ‘lay-people’ and NOT monks. This being the case, what is Master Xu Yun referring to when he states that there is ‘no difference’ between the ordained Sangha and the laity?

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