Tall, enormous buildings, adorned with intricate gold details and designs in the foothills of a beautiful valley in an Asian country. This is what I pictured when I thought of a Buddhist temple. I was not aware that Buddhist temples were so easily accessible in our communities like churches. You can blame that on my ignorance of the religion. When William Anderson began inviting members of our class to attend a service with him at the Buddhist temple, I was very excited and intrigued to find out how different and alike this would be to my own religion.
Religion is a set of beliefs in supernatural beings and forces directed at the helping people make sense of the world and solve important problems. According to our book, many anthropologists have observed over the years that all societies have some level of recognizable sets of beliefs and behaviors that would be considered religious. Buddhism and Christianity are separate religions but share the fact that both have been part of the revitalization movement, because their aim is to breath new life and purpose into society.
Religion is a set of beliefs in supernatural beings and forces directed at the helping people make sense of the world and solve important problems. According to our book, many anthropologists have observed over the years that all societies have some level of recognizable sets of beliefs and behaviors that would be considered religious. Buddhism and Christianity are separate religions but share the fact that both have been part of the revitalization movement, because their aim is to breath new life and purpose into society.
I grew up a very conservative Christian. I am the daughter of a pastor and missionary and the niece of the Director of Hispanic Ministries in North Alabama. Christianity has always been an extremely essential part of my life. Being a Christian and having a strong personal relationship with my Lord Jesus Christ is an important part of my life that will continue to infiltrate my day-to-day activities and influence my thoughts, choices and behaviors in the future. However, this was not always the case. There was a time in my life that I was not sure why I was a Christian and I began to question our beliefs and practices. However, the more I learned about other religions, the more I came back to Christianity. I reviewed Buddhism very briefly during this time and there were some things that immediately stood out that I knew I didn’t and couldn’t ever agree with and dismissed my further studying of the this religion. The hardest thing I could not come to grasps with is the belief of reincarnation. Especially because they believe there is a possibility of being reincarnated as an animal, even an insect. In addition, Buddhists do not directly pray to anyone. They do not pray to Buddha himself, they meditate on his teachings. This was hard for me because when I pray, I would like to know there is someone who is all-powerful and listening to my thoughts and petitions. Even though I knew that I did not agree with the beliefs of Buddhists, I was excited to accompany William to learn more about his religion and his choice to convert.
I met William at Barnes and Noble and we rode to the temple. We pulled into a small strip mall and if it were not for him being with me and telling me it was the Buddhist temple, there is no way that I would have known. However, when we walked inside, there was color and decorations everywhere. William told me that each painting or ornament symbolized a specific meaning. When we walked into the temple, there was a wall immediately in front of the door. In between, the wall and the door there were about 15 pairs of shoes. I immediately realized this meant to take our shoes off before we continued inside. I am glad I wore flip-flops because they were very easy to slip on and off J the reading had already begun, so William helped me get a mat and pillow to sit on and we each got a book with prayers and meditations. William told me to place this in my lap. I later read on the website for the temple that they do this out of respect and reverence to the holy text. We sat for a while listening to the teachings of Lama Ven. Tenzin Deshek. Afterwards, they began reading prayers out of the book. I could not bring myself to recite them because it felt wrong reciting texts of a different religion than my own. However, I read the words to the prayers and it was very interesting that they reminded me of many scriptures we have in the Bible. Many of the teachings are the same and this was something I did not expect to find. Then Lama Deshek rang a bell and meditation began. There was complete and total silence. It was so silent it almost felt like other people could hear my thoughts! I believe this was a time that the Buddhist meditated over the prayers, meditations and teachings they had just received. I took this time to reflect upon my own religion and prayed to my God. We sat there for what seemed forever and I have to admit my butt began falling asleep! This was the biggest part of culture shock for me because I come from churches where we have a band, a lot of music, a lot of standing and praising. We have prayer and meditations, but even that is usually not quite. We also have many kids at our church and I was very curious as how children would be in this type of setting. However, if the children were born into this culture, it is normal to them to sit for a long period in total and utter silence. This is an example of enculturation. The children learn the culture from their parents and friends that are a part of that culture. Their behaviors and ideas are learned. Therefore, they acquire the behavior of silently sitting through the meditation services. Afterwards, the Lama rang the bell again and this signified that the time of meditation was over. He stood up and everyone stood up. I did not know what we were doing but I seen everyone bowing down as he walked by so I did the same. I felt very uncomfortable not knowing what or why I was doing that. I decided to do it anyways though because I was a guest and even though I do not agree with the teachings of Lama Deshek, I respect him.
After the service was over we cleaned up the mats and pillows and they passed around candy, cashews, and the best tea ever. We were able to sit and talk for a while and I was able to ask William many questions as to why he converted to Buddhism. This especially interested me because he is the son of a minister as well. He told me that he had been researching and doing a lot of reading into many religions and Buddhism felt the most right to him. There was a specific quote by the Buddha that attracted his attention that he felt put Buddhism on a different level than other religions. The quote is “Do not accept any of my words on faith,believing them just because I said them. Be like an analyst buying gold, who cuts, burns, and critically examines his product for authenticity. Only accept what passes the test by proving useful and beneficial in your life. The Buddha” I have to admit that there were some questions that I asked William that we had completely different views on and I was slightly offended at some of his answers but I was glad to know that he kept everything 100% real with me. Buddhism and Christianity share many great things. However, at the end, I stand by my choice to be a Christian, but was happy to be able to have a better understanding of Buddhism.
Lama Deshek
Me standing in front of the alter. Every piece on the alter has a meaning and represents something significant in the Buddhist religion.
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