Students from Carmel College visits the Temple for Religious Study – Learning about the Rebirth of Life

On 7th June, Carmel College’s Head of Religious Studies Betty Harrison led 150 students visit the temple as a part of their cross religious studies. They were welcomed by Venerable Rulian, Venerable Miaoyu and BLIA volunteers. They then invited Venerable Miaoyu of the English Community Education section to give a lecture titled “The Rebirth of Life”, where she explained life after death from a Buddhist perspective.

Venerable Miaoyu opened with the questions of: “Where did life come from? Who is owner of our lives?” To this she further explained with Buddhist terminologies of Cause and Effect, Rebirth, Karma, 12 Link Chains of Dependent Origination, where the emphasis is that the rebirth of life is due to the relationship of cause and effect through karmic forces, not due to any sort of supernatural power. “It is the wholesome and unwholesome karma generated by our action, speech and thoughts during daily that brings out rebirth…” Using examples from life’s anecdotes, the Venerable explained the relationship between karma, 12 Link Chains Link Dependent Origination and Six Realms of Rebirth. She also explained that: “The Five Aggregate is the accumulation of form and mental components of sensation, perception, volition and consciousness.” All the wholesome and unwholesome deeds we’ve done are stored within the Alaya Consciousness, which is the “Aggregate of Consciousness” and what dictate our mind. Hence the continuous birth and death of sentient beings are due to everyone’s wholesome and unwholesome actions, which are constantly changing. The karmic seed of all these actions are stored within our respective Storehouse Consciousness. Due to different severity of each person’s stored karma, their respective karmic retribution of birth and death are also different. Through this short 40 minutes lecture, the students have developed their initial understanding toward the profound principals of Buddhism.

Then the students gathered in the Courtyard to settle their mind and body through sitting meditation. This was followed by visiting the “Enlightenment of an Indian Prince” exhibition, where they learned about the Buddha’s life and Enlightenment, purified their mind, made wishes and blessings by bathing the Buddha. Finally the day’s enriching trip was completed.

Their teacher Betty Harrison explained they’ve visited the Auckland Cathedral earlier and now came to this temple to learn about Buddhism’s representative architecture and experience Buddhism’s principals behind culture and education. This became the opportunity for these religious studies student to learn about the Buddhism’s teaching on the Cycle of Birth and Death.

Venerable Rulian showed the temples appreciate for their visit to learn about the temple and Buddhism’s function through learning exchange and experiencing meditation. She also invited everyone to join the temple’s Open Day on 12th June. She also gave gifts of Venerable Master Hsing Yun’s “366 Days of Wisdom” books with the visitors.