KONA HONGWANJI
BUDDHIST TEMPLE
E - JIHO
July 2012
Theme & Slogan 2012: Path of Entrusting: Recite the Nembutsu!
Film “ALOHA BUDDHA”
Friday, July 6, 2012 at 6:30 pm in Social Hall
Sponsored by Kona Hongwanji Buddhist Temple and Daifukuji Soto Mission
More information found in this issue of Jiho
KEEI BUDDHIST CHURCH and CEMETERY BON SERVICE and DANCE
Saturday, July 21, 2012
Cemetery Service at 5:00 pm - Bon Service at 6:00 pm - Bon Dance at 7:00 pm
KONA HONGWANJI BON DANCE
Saturday, July 28, 2012
Lantern Parade at 6:30 pm Bon Dance at 7:00 pm
Visitation by the Junior Choir of San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin Dharma School
HATSU BON SERVICE
Sunday, July 29, 2012 at 9:00 am
Guest Speaker: Reverend Ryoso Toshima
Junior Choir of San Jose Buddhist Church Betsuin Dharma School
NEED THE ASSISTANCE OF THE MINISTER OR TO SCHEDULE SERVICES/ACTIVITIES
Please call the church office at 323-2993 Monday thru Friday 8:00 a.m. to 4:00 p.m. Office will be closed on weekends and holidays. If unable to contact the office clerk, leave a message on the answering machine. In case of emergencies and unable to contact office clerk, call Rev. Shoji Matsumoto at
323-2993 or cell 987-9900, or Norma Matsumoto at 323-2552 or cell 989-3015.
JULY
1 Sunday …....9:00 AM …Sunday Service @ Hualalai Regency
6 Friday ………6:30 PM …Aloha Buddha film presentation in Social Hall
8 Sunday ……8:00 AM …Judo Club Market Day Baking
9:00 AM ...English Family Service
11 Wednesday ..8:00 AM …Judo Club Market Day Manju Baking
13 Friday ……8:30 AM …Senior Activity Program
1:00 PM …Judo Club Market Day Set-up
14 Saturday …7:00 AM …Judo Club Pancake Breakfast & Market Day
15 Sunday ….9:00 AM …English Family Service
21 Saturday …5:00 PM …Keei Buddhist Church & Cemetery - Cemetery Bon Service
6:00 PM …Keei Buddhist Church Bon Service
7:00 PM … Keei Buddhist Church Bon Dance
22 Sunday ……………………………NO SUNDAY SERVICE
24 Tuesday …8:00 AM …Preschool Orientation
28 Saturday …7:00 AM …Yagura Set-up
8:00 AM …Hosha #1; Omigaki #2; Food Prep #3
6:30 PM …O-Bon Lantern Parade
7:00 PM …Bon Dance
29 Sunday …9:00 AM …Hatsubon Service
AUGUST
2 Thursday …9:30 AM …Minister’s Meeting in Honokaa
5 Sunday ……9:00 AM …English Family Service
8 Wednesday ..7:00 PM …Board of Directors Meeting
10 Friday …..8:30 AM …Senior Activity Program
11 Saturday ………………………….Ikebana Cancelled
12 Sunday …9:00 AM …Cemetery Bon Service
19 Sunday …9:00 AM …English Family Service
25 Saturday …8:00 AM …Omigaki #1
26 Sunday …..9:00 AM …English Family Service
CUB SCOUTS & BOY SCOUTS
EVERY MONDAY CUB SCOUT PACK 12 MEETING AT 5:00 PM
EVERY WEDNESDAY & THURSDAY CUB SCOUT PACK 12 MEETING AT 5:00 PM EXCEPT 1ST WEDNESDAY
EVERY TUESDAY BOY SCOUT TROOP 59 MEETING AT 7:00 PM
TAIKO PRACTICE
EVERY THURSDAY TAIKO PRACTICE AT 5:30 PM
TAIKO MEETING EVERY 2nd THURSDAY IN THE SOCIAL HALL AT 6:30 PM
JUDO PRACTICE
JUDO CLUB MEETING EVERY 1ST WEDNESDAY IN SCOUT ROOM
EVERY MONDAY AT 7:00 PM NIGHT CLASS
EVERY WEDNESDAY AT 6:00 PM NOVICE; 7:00 PM NIGHT CLASS
EVERY TUESDAY AT 6:30 PM ADULT BEGINNERS
EVERY THURSDAY AT 7:00 PM CHOKE ARM BAR CLASS
IKEBANA
EVERY 2ND SATURDAY AT 9:00 AM IN THE SCOUT ROOM
TAI CHI CLASSES
EVERY MONDAY & WEDNESDAY AT 10:30 AM
DHARMA TALK CLASSES
EVERY TUESDAY AT 9:00 AM and 7:00 PM IN THE CONFERENCE ROOM
KYUDO CLASSES
EVERY SATURDAY AT 1:00 PM IN THE JUDO HALL
BON DANCE PRACTICE for JULY
BEGINNING MONDAY JULY 9TH
EVERY MONDAY & THURSDAY @ 7:30 pm
UP THRU THURSDAY JULY 26TH
MEMORIAL SERVICES FOR JULY and AUGUST 2012
One Year (2011)August22 YOSHITAKA TAKASHIBA
25 CALVIN TADASHI HATA
Three Years (2010)July30CHAYSON KIYOSHI E. MATSUOKA
August 24MASAMI IWASHITA
Seven Years (2006)July7JANICE FUKIE SASAKI 16 MILDRED UMEYO IMAI
Thirteen Years (2000)July14ERNEST YASUTO SAITO
16ELAINE NATSUYO FUJINO
18HENRY MATSUDA
30TOORU MIZOSHIRI
August13WILBERT MASASHI SHIRAKI, JR.
Seventeen Years (1996)July2MITSUO KIRA
10YOSHINO MASUTOMI
23YOSOTO EGAMI
24NORMAN TAKESHI KAKU
August6AYAKO MORINOUE
14ELICIA KIMIKO TANIGUCHI
22GEORGE KIMIO SHIMIZU
23MITSUE UEDA
Twenty-Five Years (1988)July14KENSO OHTA
30RIKIO MORIMOTO
August4SHUNICHI EGE
14TSUKUMO SONODA
Thirty-Three Years (1980)July28CLARENCE NAKAHARA
August12SUEJYU TASHIMA
Fifty Years (1963)July3GENZO FUJII
8YOSHIO TAKIMOTO
9SHIMA UCHIDA
25KIMIE HIGASHI
29CHIEKO NAGAMINE
August6GILBERT GISABURO YAMANE
One Hundred Years (1913)July22HARUKICHI NAKASHIMA
August18YASUTARO MATSUOKA
21YONEKO KABAYAMA
28HATSUKO MOTOYAMA
29 ISONO KANEKO
President’s Message – June 2012 by: Norma Matsumoto
It has intrigue!! It features the Big Island! It has less adventure than I’d like, and no romance…but it is truly historical, informative and explains the situation we find ourselves in today as Shin Buddhists. At the last Giseikai, then president, Stanley Kunitomo, Reverend Shoji, Linda Nagai and I were treated to a viewing of the film ‘ALOHA BUDDHA’. Imagine our gentle Rev. Shoji way back in those days, as our only source of information and with negotiation powers with our plantation bosses! Imagine that kind of power that Rev. Shoji would have with those plantation bosses in his pocket and our rapt attention for his take on our working conditions. It shows how important and powerful the Buddhist priests were in those plantation days and how it influenced the profound growth of Buddhist churches at the time. We also met the film’s maker, Lorraine Minatoishi-Palumbo. Please join us on Friday, July 6, 2012 at 6:30pm in the Social Hall to view the film for a $5 donation.
As an update on the new rental; your Kyodan board members had a tour of the house and are quite pleased with the progress…it’ll be about August or so for the house blessing, though. We will have our second yard cleaning on June 23rd, Saturday, from 8:00 – 11:30am w/lunch & pupus to follow. We will finally have a tenant in the units that have been empty for about a year or so. I would like to thank in advance the volunteers for the second yard cleaning session. Thanks go out to Norman Takeoka, Randy Manago, Ron Sugiyama, Stanley Kunitomo, Morris Nagata, Makiko Yamaguchi (and a few others who are still smart enough to avoid my phone messages…ha, ha!). I’ll catch them at painting time for the Kohala end rental at the Old Hospital Property, though…
In Gassho,
FOR YOUR INFORMATION by Mary Katayama
Bon Festival: The 9th Annual Bon Festival was a huge success. The crowd was much larger than last year. It was wonderful to see everyone enjoying themselves. Many in attendance were tourists, community members/families, as well as dancers from Hilo, Kohala, Puna, Kamuela and Sangha friends. We thank the Taiko Group, Boy Scouts Troop 59 and their families, our faithful Kyodan helpers who assisted in the set-up, clean-up and working at various stations during the festival. Special thanks to the Daifukuji Taiko Group for participating in the program. Last but not least we say thank you to Keauhou Shopping Center for having the Bon Festival for 9 years. Mahalo!
Education Fund: In March, two Jr. YBA members attended the YESS camp on Oahu. In June, 8 members along with 2 advisors will be attend the Annual Jr. YBA Convention in Honolulu. Monies from the Education Fund was given to the Jr. YBA to assist with expenses. Also Aimee Shiraki received monies to attend the 2012 YBICSE in Japan.
MEMORIAL DAY by Rev. Shoji
Today (Monday, May 28) we observed our Memorial Day Service with the guest speaker,
Mr. Lincoln Ashida, Hawaii County Corporation Council. At the end of his message he quoted Michael Josephson’s What Will Matter: “What will matter is not your competence, but your character. What will matter is not how many people you knew, but how may will feel a lasting loss when you are gone. What will matter is not your memories, but the memories that live in those who loved you. What will matter is how long you will be remembered, by whom and for what. Living a life that matters does not happen by accident. It is not a matter circumstance but of choice. Choose to live a life that matters.”
“Memorial Day,” says the Washington Post, “is essentially the fulfillment of a personal obligation to remember to say of someone we knew, or loved or whose name we read on a plaque or whose troubled face we see in a long-ago documentary film: You lost all, or nearly all, before your time had come, but you shall not be forgotten.”
Back in May 30, 1999 when we observed Hawaii Betsuin’s Memorial Day Service, we read Ruth Tabrah’s Memorial Day aspiration. In it she said, “Each of those whose memory is honored here today, whether their names are read or unread, known or unknown are part of the timeless treasure with which we connect in Namu-amida-butsu. They are themselves the nembutsu that we hear echoing in our lives. To hear this enables us to say Namu-amida-butsu. To say this, here today, becomes a compassionate remembrance of how painful it is for parents to lose a child, a child losing a parent, families losing a loved one, as casualties of a war. To thus hear and recite Namu-amida-butsu is to become one with the wisdom of Amida’s fulfilled vow. This vow-power working in our lives encourages us to seek ways to end war, and to find peaceful solutions to conflict in the world, our nation, our community, and in our own lives. This is why, in Shinran’s Shoshinge, we say “I take refuge in the Amida Buddha of Immeasurable Life. I entrust myself to the Buddha of Inconceivable Light.”
In his Proclamation Prayer for Peace, Memorial Day, 2012 our President Obama said: “Our nation endures and thrives because of the devotion of our men and women in uniform, who, from generation to generation, carry a burden heavier than any we may ever know. On Memorial Day, we honor those who have borne conflict’s greatest cost, mourn where the wounds of war are fresh, and pray for a just, lasting peace.
“The American fabric is stitched with the stories of sons and daughters who gave their lives in service to the country they loved. They were patriots who overthrew an empire and sparked revolution. They were courageous men and women who strained to hold a young Union together. They were ordinary citizens who rolled back the creeping tide of tyranny, who stood post through a long twilight struggle, who saw terror and extremism threaten our world’s security and said, ‘I’ll go.’ And though their stories are unique to the challenges they faced, our fallen service members are forever bound by a legacy of valor older than the Republic itself. Now they lie at rest in quiet corners of our country and the world, but they live on in the families who loved them and in the soul of a Nation that is safer for their service.
“Today we join together in prayer for the fallen. We remember all who have borne the battle, whose devotion to duty has sustained our country and kept safe our heritage as a free people in a free society. Though our hears ache in their absence, we find comfort in knowing that their legacy lives on in all of us in the security that lets us live in peace. The prosperity that allows us to pursue our dreams, and the love that still beats in those who knew them. May God bless the souls of the venerable warriors we have lost, and may He watch over the men and women who serve us now. Today, tomorrow, and in perpetuity, let us give thanks to them by remaining true to the values and virtues for which they fight.”
Go for Broke! Memories of Hawai'i Japanese 'Niseis' by: Susan Shirota
This is a documentary film about the history of Hawaii Japanese ‘nisei’ – American-born sons of Japanese immigrants – and their role in the 442nd Regiment. The Japanese-American 442nd Regiment Combat Team, including the 100th Infantry Batalion, and the Military Intelligence Service was an all-nisei US Army regiment which served in Europe during World War II. They are the most decorated unit in US Military history. The motto of the 442nd was “Go for Broke”. Over 30 veterans of the 442nd were interviewed for this film.
Winner of the Best of Hawaii Honolulu Film Awards, 2012. Director Hiroyuki Matsumoto will be present to introduce his film.
A trailer of the film may be viewed at:
Screening of the film will be on Sunday, July 1, 2012 at Konawaena High School Cafeteria in Kealakekua with a “talk-story” at 6:30 pm and showing of film (approx. 98 minutes) at 7:30 pm, admission by donation. Sponsored by the Kona Japanese Civic Association.
For additional information, contact Uki Izawa at 936-6639.
ALOHA BUDDHA FILM -----The Story of Japanese Buddhism in Hawaii
Japanese Buddhism in Hawaii may be the most unique form of Buddhism in the world. Brought over by Japanese immigrants who came to work on the sugar plantations, the pressure of politics, Americanization and Christianity helped acculturate the religion in surprising and unique ways in Hawaii. Japanese Buddhist built Indian style temples, filled them with Christian style pews and sang modified hymns which praised the Buddha instead of Jesus. It was all done as part of the “American Way”.
Today however, the religion is fading and the temples are closing. Now there is a rush to save Japanese Buddhism’s history before it is gone altogether. As we talk to the elders of the region, we discover that Japanese Buddhism played a key role in shaping Hawaii’s religious identity, the internment of Japanese Americans during World War II and establishment of Buddhism in America. There is also a movement underway to save the religion – by adding a little aloha into the practice.
From the Aloha Buddha website
Buddhism Versus Being Buddhist by William Tokuko Lundquist
This could very well be my last article for the Ji-Ho, since we are moving back to Oregon in the middle of July. We don’t really want to leave Hawaii, least of all the Buddhist Sangha at Kona Hongwanji, but with prices rising and my wife’s teaching salary still falling, our budget has finally reached the breaking point. Even so, it was hard to choose between remaining here as homeless people, or returning to the more affordable, but infinitely colder and wetter Oregon coast. I try to remember that even Shakyamuni Buddha was forced to leave his home in his last years and wander in places where he wasn’t entirely welcome. He accepted everything that came his way with grace, knowing that fighting the inevitable would just cause more suffering for himself and others.
It’s hard for me to believe that I’ve written about 50 of these articles during the past four years, some based on things I read and some on the discussions held in our freewheeling Tuesday night Dharma classes. You’ve even been gracious enough to ask me to speak on a few occasions, which is way harder than writing this stuff down.
In my first talk, I told you I was here to learn about Buddhism, having just come from a town in eastern Oregon where I was introduced to Shin Buddhism by George Iseri, a man I was privileged to call my friend for a few years before he passed away. I naturally assumed that you, as lifelong Buddhists, would know everything that there was to know about Buddhism, and that you would teach me. When many of you confided that you really didn’t know all that much about Buddhism, I thought it was just polite modesty. I was amazed to find that you were telling the truth. When it comes to the history, philosophy and other details of Buddhism, even Jodo Shinshu Buddhism, only Rev. Shoji had a vast store of knowledge, and even he would admit that Buddhism is so large that no one can really learn more than a small fraction of it in one lifetime.
On the mainland, we haoles learn everything from books and lectures and written tests, so that is how I approached Buddhism, and I was happy to share what I was learning with you through these articles. I wanted to contribute what I could. I learned, however, that your Japanese-American-Hawaiian culture approached teaching differently. Whether the subject is Taiko drumming, Bon dancing or anything else, the students watch those who know what they are doing and try to follow along to the best of their abilities, until they are finally the ones who know what they are doing. That is how you taught me what you could about Bon dancing, but also about Buddhism. You showed me what being Buddhist is truly all about, by just being exceptionally good Buddhists. We didn’t really find as much aloha in Hawaii as we expected, except at the Kona Hongwanji Temple and the Daifukuji Soto Mission, where treating people with true aloha seems to be the rule.
I told you that my friend George Iseri, an angry young man after being imprisoned during World War II, said in his later years that he never felt a day was complete unless he had helped someone with something. I think Morris follows the same philosophy, except he must think even a minute is wasted unless he is helping someone. Then there is Betty, probably the world’s oldest teenager now that Dick Clark is gone. Her unflagging energy and enthusiasm are joyously contagious. I don’t even know how it is possible for Mary and all the Katayamas to be everywhere at all times helping make everything happen. Over at the Daifukuji, Rev. Jiko and the Nakades fill that role, though she would insist that it is all the people helping her who really make everything possible. Christians are fond of saying that it is better to give than to receive, but it is the Buddhists in Kona who really prove giving and helping is the most satisfying way to live.
I learned about Buddhas and Bodisattvas in books, but I understood what those terms really meant when I began to meet them at the temples. The Dalai Lama is supposed to be a reincarnation of Avalokiteshvara, the Bodhisattva of compassion the Japanese call Kannon. He does an admirable job of filling that role, but he’s got nothing on Rev. Jiko, who so identifies with Kannon that she herself has become a Bodhisattva of compassion. I’m sure she would say she is just following the example of her elders. We are taught in Jodo Shinshu Buddhism that people become Buddhas and Bodhisattvas only in the Pure Land, not here, but I have met so many of them at the temples. Jane, from my Dharma class, springs to mind, followed by many others, too many to list.
In my small way, I’ve tried to teach you something about Buddhism that you might not have known before, which may have been entertaining for those of you who were interested. Much more importantly, you have shown me what it is to be Buddhist, which is the whole point of Buddhism. Shakyamuni, and the wise men who came after him, including Shinran Shonin and Dogen Zenji, all encouraged people to not just try to understand Buddhism intellectually, but to try it out in their own lives. For the past four years, I’ve been privileged to learn how to do that by watching people who really know how to be Buddhists. I may find no card-carrying Buddhists on the Oregon coast, but I will recognize Buddhas or Bodisattvas if I see them, because they will be acting like you. Mahalo nui loa and Namu Amida Butsu. If we don’t meet again in this lifetime, please save a spot for me in the Pure Land.