NEWS

Japanese Buddhist Temples Share Devotional Offerings with Disadvantaged Families

By Craig Lewis | | Buddhistdoor Global

Buddhist monks at Todai-ji, an eighth century Buddhist temple in the Japanese city of Nara, have joined a growing nationwide initiative to share devotional offerings donated by worshippers with single mothers and other financially struggling families. The socially engaged move is part of a broader anti-poverty initiative organized by a non-profit group known as the Otera Oyatsu Club (Temple Snack Club), which was established to redistribute food offerings received by temples to single-parent households.

The Otera Oyatsu Club has placed collection boxes in Todai-ji’s main hall to collect donation from the crowds of visitors to the temple and to raise awareness about the hidden issue of poverty in Japan. Signs in Chinese, English, and Korean explain the initiative for the numerous foreign tourists who visit the temple. Funds collected help to cover the costs of transporting devotional offerings given by worshippers to disadvantaged families. Todai-ji was one of the powerful Seven Great Temples of the former Japanese capital Nara. Originally founded in 738 CE and opened in 752 CE, the temple is a listed UNESCO World Heritage Site and the Japanese headquarters of the Kegon (Ch: Huayan) school of Buddhism. Its main hall houses the world’s largest bronze statue of Vairocana Buddha.

Headquartered in Tokyo, the Otera Oyatsu Club is a joint project founded in 2014, the founders of which include Shokei Matsumoto, a monk from Komyo-ji, a temple in central Tokyo, who, armed with an MBA degree, is working to transform temple management across Japan and the role of Buddhist temples in Japanese society.** Another founder of the organization is 43-year-old Seiro Matsushima, chief priest at the Jodo-school temple Anyo-ji in the town of Tawaramoto in Nara Prefecture. Matsushima was stirred into action after hearing the news of how the bodies of a young mother and her three-year-old son were discovered in their Osaka apartment months after they had died in 2013. The only food found in their home was salt, and the authorities attributed the cause of death to starvation or murder-suicide. The mother reportedly left a note, apparently written for her son, that read: “I’m sorry you could not eat your fill.” (The Asahi Shimbun)



Otera Oyatsu Club members prepare boxes of necessities for

disadvantaged families at Kuon-ji, a Buddhist temple in Nagoya.

From japantimes.co.jp