Saturday, December 14, 2013

True Buddha Pai Yuin: True Buddha School

Back in November, a friend asked me to help her find a Buddhist monk to say a prayer for her grandmother who had recently passed away in China. I took her to the True Buddha Pai Yuin temple that is located on Centre Street in Calgary.  There are traditional Buddhist monks and nuns and a Buddha master that live on the premises of the temple. The temple is open to the general public and all are welcome to attend their services.  The Buddha ceremonies at the temple have English translation of the written text and even have English translators who you can listen  to on a wireless headset.  I attended a couple of their services that can last for two to three hours that consists of chanting and bowing and meditation.  One of the nuns provided me a detailed explanation of all the different Buddhas, , and deities. I discovered that the statues are used to help you to visualize and internalize your spiritual feelings of inner peace. True Buddha School (TBS) was found by Living Buddha Lian-sheng, Sheng-yen Lu. The drive  fro TBS is to bring Buddhist ideology into contemporary society, help sentient beings achieve spiritual realization, see their Buddha nature, and end the cycle of death and rebirth using distinct practices from Taoism, Sutrayana and Vajrayana Buddhism. TBS currently has more than five million disciples and four hundred establishments ( temples, chapters, and cultivation groups) spreading the Buddhadharma.