Official Opening Ceremony for the Sitting Buddha at the Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery in Myanmar
The sacred duty to safeguard the Dharma knows no national boundaries. For the Sitting Buddha respectfully situated at the Green Jade Hall of Fortune of Ling Jiou Mountain's (LJM) School of Sramaneras at Naung Mon, Myanmar, there was an austere ritual and a solemn opening ceremony on December 4 to bestow blessings on the Hall. With a capacity to accommodate a thousand people participating in all kinds of Buddhist activities, the Hall will also be the place where the sramaneras study, meditate and practice Buddhism. LJM Founding Abbot Dharma Master Hsin Tao and five Mahasangha deputies of the highest degree of Myanmar sprinkled Auspicious Water onto the Stele of Merits as part of the ribbon-cutting ceremony, with some two thousand people in the audience to witness the historic event. Local people describe it as unprecedented, which goes to indicate that Myanmar authorities positively recognize and hold in high esteem the Venerable Master Hsin Tao and the LJM Buddhist Society.
The five top-ranking Mahasangha deputies assigned by Myanmar's Ministry of Religion for the occasion were Bhaddanta Candhimabhivamsa, Bhaddanta Sumingalabhivamsa, Bhaddanta Dhammacara, Bhaddanta Vimala, and Bhaddanta Pannadhaja of the country's Central Committee of Sanghas. They arrived in Lashio for the event to join Dharma Master Hsin Tao and the Bhutanese Master Rinpoche. All three major schools of Buddhism were thus present on the occasion to offer collective blessings to the event and the participants consisting of guests of honor, devout followers, sramaneras, nuns with vows of precepts, and Bhikkhus.
The Opening Ceremony began at around 10 AM in an engaging, solemn atmosphere. Dharma Master Hsin Tao presented citations of gratitude to longtime supporters of the Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery, before conducting the ribbon-cutting together with special guests of honor. Auspicious Water was sprinkled onto the Stele of Merits that commemorates the Award of Highest Achievement of Meditation certified/issued by the Myanmar government and received by Venerable Master Hsin Tao. The host then led the well-wishing delegation into the Green Jade Hall to recite the 《Patthana》.
Starting at 9 AM the day before on December 3rd, LJM pilgrimage participants led by the State Pariyatti Sasana University Rector Venerable Bhaddanta Dr. Kumara in reciting sutras, whereas Bhikkhus took turns to continue the chanting non-stop for 24 hours. LJM's local volunteers had moved onto the venue even earlier to cook for worshippers in their prayers for dedication to the promotion of Buddha's teachings. The Hall of the Sitting Buddha will be an important future bastion for the incubation of Buddhist, and as such it will be a beacon for sentient beings.
For the opening ceremony for the Hall of the Sitting Buddha of the Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery at Naung Mon in Lashio, Dharma Master Hsin Tao expressed gratitude to the five top-ranking Mahasangha deputies of Myanmar, the State Pariyatti Sasana University Rector Venerable Kumara, and Mandelay Pariyatti Sasana University Registrar Ven.Bhaddanta Dr.Kumuda, the Bhutanese Master Rinpoche, as well as leaders who head up cultural communities of the ethnics group of DAI / BLANG / KOKANG, and all other on-ground followers and volunteers of the LJM Buddhist Society.
Dharma Master Hsin Tao was born in 1948 in a war-torn Burma to ethnic Chinese parents in Kokang's suburbs. Orphaned at four, he tagged along the Solitary Army for survival and eventually arrived in Taiwan at the age of 14 when the armed forces retreated from the war zone. The Master never once forgot about his birthplace and has always been sparing no efforts for charitable causes in Myanmar. The Master revisited Lashio in numerous attempts to find the right place to educate and promote dharma and found out about the collateral damage of war in the case of orphans and poverty. Such background gave rise to the origin of the Maha Kusala Yama Monastery sramanera School, Naung Mon in Lashio.
Dharma Master Hsin Tao pointed out that the Green Jade Hall of Fortune is a grand and sacred place of worship made possible by the collective support and willpower of Buddhists. The place can accommodate more than a thousand monastics reciting sutras together, where laypeople can learn about Buddhism. People offering support to the Hall whether in monetary sponsorship or in-kind will all receive in return great merits of positive karma that pave the way for smooth progress ahead in the pursuit of the Buddha's way.
Besides establishing the School of Sramaneras for underprivileged children, LJM has plans to build up a platform of precepts and an academy of Pali, with a Thilashin's school and a Hall of Guanyin as further parts of the overall plan - so that followers in Myanmar can enjoy a multipurpose establishment for Buddhist studies, meditation practice, pilgrimage, leisure, and tourism. Furthermore, there will also be a vocational school of agriculture for hands-on in organic farming, compost making, high-yield substitutes growing, etc. Thus accordingly, the Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery is hopeful of becoming a place of education for both the physical and the spiritual spheres, so that people can enjoy a spiritual sanctuary that embodies a blissful paradise.
The LJM Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery Chief Executive, Master Heng Ming, pointed out that education and ecology are part and parcel of a decade-old vow Dharma Master Hsin Tao took for Myanmar. Almost half-way through since the School of Sramanas was established in 2016, the size of the scale grew from near-100 to several hundred. Many parents came from abroad and the Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery Naung Mon has quickly become a recognized cradle of future international sanghas. The curriculum is based on the government-sanctioned syllabus and the Buddhist studies cover meditation, the study of the Pali language, mandarin Chinese, civics, etc. Pupils of the School of Sramanas embrace a brand new chapter of their lives from Day 1 there, and the school is indeed a brave new world where Buddha's children of the future are nurtured.
The LJM Buddhist Society has been implementing Dharma Master Hsin Tao's ideals of "Loving the Earth / Loving Peace" for many years. In Taiwan, the "An Hour A Month for Beach Cleaning" campaign has become an exemplary environmental initiative. The same ecological aspirations are being shared on to the young pupils of the School of Sramaneras in Myanmar. Authorities in Myanmar also think highly of ecology and the LJM Mahā Kusalā Yāma Monastery with its monastics followed the example of the Prime Minister of the Shan State, His Excellency Linn Htut, and planted a total of one thousand trees just this past July. In parallel, the LJM Naung Mon Farm has been benefiting the local farming communities with hands-on for its organic/non-toxic farming as a concrete manifestation of our care for ecology, and with that, our love for the Earth which has been recognized locally.