Celebrating International Buddha’s Light Day
On the afternoon of 16th May, International Buddha’s Light Day was held by BLIA South Island at FGS South Island Dining Hall. Those attending this celebration included Venerable Abbess Manshin, Venerable Jueying, BLIA North Island President Ms. Tsai, BLIA North and South Island committee members and over one hundred devotees.
The celebration commenced with BLIA South Island President Mr. Almeric Cheng’s welcoming speech. This was followed by BLIA South Island Director Mr. Eugene You describing the purpose and origin of International Buddha’s Light Day. He also went onto giving a brief overview of the history behind establishing BLIA South Island and how it developed to what it is today. Next, BLIA South Island Director Ms. Louisa Guo proudly gave a presentation on the dedication and achievement of BLIA South Island members in areas including art, cultural, charity and education in the Christchurch area for the past decade.
The dedication of BLIA South Island members have brought a great element of surprise to the lives of residents within Christchurch and the round of applause received added to the honour and pride of members of BLIA South Island. Following that, President Cheng introduced to the audience future plans for BLIA South Island and President of BLIA South Island YAD Andy Hsu shared the many events that have been organized by YADSNZ in the past few years and what they learned from these events.
Later on in the celebration, a Dharma Talk was delivered by Venerable Abbess Manshin to encourage the committee members and members present. During the talk, she noted that the reason for the establishment of BLIA is to aid the running of the temple, therefore, devotees must treasure the chance and help propagate Buddhism and form good affinities with the general public. With adults being good examples themselves, this will lead youths to learning more about Dharma and to contribute towards Buddhism in the future. The organizers of the celebration also seized this chance to read out the letter written by BLIA World Head Quarters Head Secretary Venerable Tzurong on behalf of Venerable Master Hsing Yun.
A series of performances were prepared for this event including the Cantonese Class students singing the Heart Sutra in Cantonese, BLIA South Island Director Ms. Yang led the committee members in sing three of BLIA’s famous songs. To top it off, members of BLIASNZ-YAD performed hand gestures to the song ‘Home of Light’, which won a big round of applause from the audience. To conclude this celebration, everyone enjoyed some delicious afternoon tea in the court yard and exchanged their thoughts and experiences.