Buddhist Rituals, Festivities in Southland to Honor Birth of the ‘Enlightened One’

Thousands of Buddhists in the Los Angeles area, like millions of others around the world, are celebrating the Buddha’s birthday today, performing ancient rituals, burning incense, chanting and praying in temples festooned with flowers and bright lanterns.

“This is a happy occasion. We rejoice and celebrate Siddhartha Gautama’s birth because his teachings have paved the way to freedom for all beings who would listen to him,” said the Rev. Chao Chu of the Rosemead Buddhist Monastery, to which more than 300 families belong.

Siddhartha Gautama, whose influence on Eastern civilization was as profound as Jesus Christ’s was on the Western world, was born a prince 2,537 years ago in northeast India, near the border of Nepal. According to the lunar calendar, today is April 8, the birth date of the Buddha, a title that means “enlightened one” or “awakened one.”

Buddhism, with more than 300 million followers, is the world’s fourth-largest religion, after Christianity, Islam and Hinduism.

In Los Angeles’ sizable Asian immigrant communities, Buddhists will partake in the traditional bathing ceremony through Sunday in houses of worship that range from Chu’s modest two-story structure in Rosemead to the $25-million Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights.

Adherents walk up to an altar where a small statue of the baby Siddhartha stands on a lotus flower, amid a bed of flowers. They kneel before it and pay their respects. Then they pour scented water over the Buddha image three times, using a ladle. For Buddhists, the scented water symbolizes the sweet rain that fell when he was born.

The bathing ceremony is followed by chanting, a sermon, prayers and a special vegetarian meal.

Apart from the bathing and religious rituals, other events will differ from temple to temple. In Koreatown, for example, monks and lay leaders from Kwan Um Sa temple will mark the end of a full week of birthday celebrations Sunday by serving food and handing out clothing, toothpaste and toothbrushes to the homeless in downtown Los Angeles. “We want to be sensitive to our surroundings,” Venerable Do-Ahn Kim said.