Buddhism

Recently I visited a Buddha temple. The one in Layton, it was pretty cool. Then this Monk dude talked to us. We had to take off our shoes when we entered the temple. It has red carpet, there are sofa’s on the left wall, and on the right, there is a platform about three feet high. On the platform there are about a dozen red mats. With what looks like the back of chairs for your back. They are red, with gold around them. By each "seat" there are signs, that tell what rank of monk you are. On the back wall, facing the entrance, is a large golden statue of Buddha. And no, he is not fat. He is wearing like a gold Greek robe looking kind of thing. In front of Buddha, there is a slightly smaller golden statue or his apostle. He is forward, and wearing the same thing. Then there is another apostle facing forward as well. And is slightly smaller than the apostle on the left. He is gold, and wears the same thing, except that he has what looks like an archway of leaves over him. The bigger one is said to have been the one that recorded all of Buddha’s teachings, and is responsible for the Buddhist bibles and records. The other one as far as I could understand, was the welfare man. He was the one who took care of the people with food and stuff like that. On the next level down, there were two more smaller statues facing each other. I’m not sure who they were though. Then they just had a bunch of weird decorations, there were these things that looked like giant eggs wearing necklaces, they were sitting in giant goblets or something. Then just a lot of little statues of men. And a lot of flowers. All kinds, each symbolizing something. There is blue, purple, white, pink and then they have big lanterns where the light bulb is in the middle of the flower pedals. In the middle of the decorations there is the little worship table. With candles and stuff. The ceiling is really curved up. With a bunch of little lantern looking decorations hanging from them.

When we entered the temple there was a monk, siting along the right wall, he had like a rust colored, toga type robe. But he said they usually where white while in the temple. He said that most of the monks there were from Thailand. He told us about the Buddhist religion. Their three main beliefs he said was :one, do no evil, two, do good, for if your just not doing evil, you should do good as well, and finally to purify your mind. One way they do this is meditation. He said that to meditate. They focus on one thing when they breath in, and something else when they breath out. Breath in is number one. Breath out is number two. Then he explained that the human mind is like a monkey, and how it just jumps around to different things. And said that half of us were thinking of something else while listening, and by the guilty laugh from everyone, I suppose he was right. When your mind jumps to something, the goal is to bring it back and tie it up on your two thoughts. It was very interesting. They also believe in the "golden rule." He said that they try to do as much as good as possible, in doing this they said that they are taken care of in return. One thing that surprised me, is how seriously they took their religion. A lot of people these days don’t take anything seriously, even when it comes to their religion, it seems they think that as long as they say they belong to a certain religion they will be saved. Even though they don’t follow any of their church "rules." From six to seven in the morning he said that they all get up and chant. Then spend time meditating to clear their mind for the day. The rest of the day they do more religious stuff. Then from six to seven in the evening they do more chanting. And more meditating. They also do not shake hands. For some reason, they do not touch other people. Instead of shaking hands, they put their hands together as if they were going to pray, and do a slight bow. It’s pretty cool. They also have like a tea, and coffee machine by the front doors. It is surprising how small it is, usually when you think of temples, you would think of a big building with a high ceiling and lots of halls and rooms. This temple on the other hand, was one room, smaller than the school cafeteria. And near the walls the ceiling is so low you almost have to duck to go without bumping your head. They have a separate building kind of in front of it, I think that is where some of the monks stay, but I’m not sure. Like I said, most of the monks that worship there are from Thailand, so it was difficult to understand the man who was talking to us because as far as I understood came here with very little. And is still trying to learn English. In fact he occasionally would stop just to make sure we were following him, and we understood.

I’m glad I had the chance to go and visit the Buddhist temple and learn about their way of life. For pretty much my whole life I just thought Buddhism was a bunch of people who admired a fat man with a bowl of fruit. I think that is one of the problems with to days teens, and not just teenagers but people of all ages, they are so naive. They get an opinion of something and don’t bother to find out wether it is true, or some made up rumor. So if you ever have the chance I would advise visiting the Buddhist monk, because, contrary to what people may think, they are not all a bunch of chubby men. And a lot friendlier than some people would think.