{"content":[{"text":"Prospectus for \n the 850th Anniversary of Shinran Shonin’s Birth and \n the 800th Anniversary of the Establishment of the Jodo Shinshu Teaching","bbox":{"left":0.178828,"top":0.069664,"width":0.641784,"height":0.059829999999999994}},{"text":"The year 2023 will mark the 850th anniversary of the birth of Shinran Shonin, the founder \n of the Jodo Shinshu Buddhist tradition, and the following 2024 will be the 800th anniversary of the \n establishment of the teaching. Accordingly in 2023, the Jodo Shinshu Hongwanji-ha Buddhist \n organization will observe commemorative services for those occasions. \n As a human, it is our nature to see things through a self-centered viewpoint, and that is why \n our life is filled with suffering. Buddhism is the wisdom that guides us to living in a way that \n transcends suffering. Amida Buddha is the one who continuously calls out to us saying, “I accept you \n as you are. I will never abandon you. Remember that I am always with you no matter how sad and \n lonely you may feel.” This message from Amida takes the form as the Buddha’s Name, Namo Amida \n Butsu. By frankly listening to that message just as it is, without any calculation, we naturally come to \n entrust ourselves to the Buddha’s guidance, and this entrusting heart enables us to become settled, \n allowing us to feel confident, safe, and able to cope with any situation. Furthermore, this settled mind \n becomes the spiritual foundation that facilitates our ability to stand up to and endure various hardships \n we experience in this world. As our expression of gratitude and indebtedness for that benevolence, \n we recite the Buddha’s Name, and this recitation is called nembutsu. Shinran Shonin is the one who \n detailed how Amida Buddha’s salvific compassion reaches and works on us, as well as concretely \n presented how we should live as a Jodo Shinshu or Nembutsu follower in this world. Thus, he \n established the teaching doctrinally as well as spiritually, and this is the significance of the \n establishment of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism by Shinran Shonin. \n More than 2,500 years ago, Sakyamuni Buddha awakened to the truth of this world and \n human beings, that is, the principles of impermanence and dependent origination. They lead us to the \n principle of ‘no-self,’ which explains that nothing in this universe has its own unchangeable and \n original substance. Despite this fact, we cannot detach ourselves from the illusionary ‘self’ that our \n own relentless human desires create. As a result, we bring suffering to ourselves and cause hostilities \n to erupt in the world. This is the universal reality that remains true even in today’s world. \n Approximately 800 years ago, Shinran Shonin deeply looked into himself and became aware \n through his own experiences that we cannot free ourselves from our blind passions, that is, our self- \n promoting way of thinking. However, he also encountered Amida Buddha’s aspiration, which the \n Buddha pledges to guide everyone to realization, leaving no one behind. Shinran Shonin expressed \n his appreciation for the Buddha’s boundless compassion through the way he lived his life, and we \n should follow his example for living our own. The dual commemorative services will be conducted \n in the spirit of expressing our gratitude for his guidance, as well as our joy of encountering the Jodo \n Shinshu teaching. \n Today, many nations and communities are placing importance only on their own economic \n growth and cultural standards, and this tendency has brought about a tenacious atmosphere of \n exclusiveness, intolerance, and even hostility to the international society, resulting in a variety of","bbox":{"left":0.095142,"top":0.155795,"width":0.80976,"height":0.764164}}],"images_bbox":[],"images_bbox_not_text_overlap":[]}