Buddha’s Birth Celebrated by Parishioners

Dressed in an orange silk robe embroidered with gold lotus flowers, the Rev. Kakei Nakagawa of the Oxnard Buddhist Church helped more than 100 parishioners celebrate Hanamatsuri, or the birthday of the Gautama Buddha, the founder of Buddhism.

Above the rustle of rambunctious children, Nakagawa asked the faithful celebrants clustered in oak pews to remember the wisdom of Buddha and what he forsook to ease their pain and bring equality to humanity.

“Buddha was a prince and he could have anything he wanted, but what he wanted was to make people happy,” he told parishioners. “So he gave away all his money and possessions so he could find the truth that would bring peace to hearts of man.”

The sermon was followed by a round of prayers, after which parishioners filed toward a small shrine made of flowers that housed an ebony statue of Buddha. Parishioners poured sweet tea over the figure as a symbolic remembrance of the perfumed rain that fell during his birth.

Also called the Flower Festival, Hanamatsuri is more than just a remembrance of Buddha’s birth some 2,600 years ago. According to Nakagawa, it is also a time when Buddhists express their joy at being able to experience dharma, or the universal order and law of the cosmos.

Traditionally, the holiday is celebrated with bunches of flowers that symbolize not only the garden of Buddha’s birth and his ascension from earthly desire to inner peace, but also the temporal nature of life on Earth. Because flowers generally die within a few days after the celebration, Buddhists are reminded of the impermanence of all things and that truth can only be found within.

Today, Buddhism is practiced by about 323 million people.

While dates vary as to when Buddha was born, most accounts put it at about 566 BC. He was born Prince Siddhartha Gautama in the Lumbini Gardens outside the Himalayan town of Kapilavastu in northern India.

Buddha preached an egalitarian doctrine that railed against the Brahmanic monopoly of India’s religious and social doctrine. While the Brahmans insisted that they were the only ones who could interpret dharma, Buddha made the doctrines available to all.

It was that spirit that brought people like Westlake Village resident Doris Kotake and her three children, all 4 years old, to the celebration.

“Even though they’re still very young, I wanted them to learn about who Buddha was, what he taught us and why he’s important,” said Kotake, 39. “And I think this is the best time to begin because this celebration is where our religion starts.”