Repentance ceremony on March 29th, Year of the Cat

On May 18th, 2023 (March 29th, Year of the Cat), good men and believing women inside and outside HCMC returned to Hoang Phap pagoda to attend the periodical penitential ceremony.

Before the rite, Junior Thich Tam Duoc, monks of the pagoda gave a dharma talk named "The power of the vow of Buddhahood" to the mass.

The Junior explains three important contents: The meaning of Vesak ceremony; What is Buddhism? The vow about Buddhahood, and how to cultivate a Bodhisattva to become a Buddha. On lunar April every year is the time when Buddha's disciples joyfully look forward to Vesak's great celebration of Buddha's birthday, which is the union of three events: "Bodhisattva Siddhartha was born, Bodhisattva attained enlightenment and Buddha entered Nirvana". These three important and sacred ceremonies help the Buddhist followers to honor the moral, compassionate and intellectual values of the World-Honored One. He shared deeply about the "Aspirational Buddhahood" of a bodhisattva who aspires to free the suffering of samsara.

In order to become a fully Enlightened Buddha, his previous lives when he was still a bodhisattva had to spend a long time practicing for 4 Asankhya (Countless eons) and 100,000 Mahakalpa (1.334.000.000 year), cultivating all ten perfections of paramita. “Giving, complying with precepts, leaving home, wisdom, diligence, patience, sincerity, vow power, loving-kindness and equanimity.” The Buddha said: The Tathagata is the Buddha that has come true; all living beings are the Buddhas that will become, the Buddha pointed out all sentient beings have the enlightened nature and have the ability to become a Buddha if the practitioner learns to follow His teachings. The Buddha taught: "This is the truth of suffering, the origin of suffering, the cessation of suffering, and the way to the cessation of suffering. "We are the owner of karma, the heir of karma, karma is the womb, karma is the relative, karma is the support. Whatever good or bad karma we have done, we will inherit it." The Buddha taught that in our thoughts, words, and actions, whether good or bad, we are the heirs of all those things.

Being a human is difficult, meeting Buddhadharma is even harder, but understanding and properly practicing His teachings is the most difficult. Thus, becoming a Buddha is extremely difficult.

Next, he told the stories of the Buddha's predecessors in the Khuddakapatha Nikaya so that the listeners could have  a correct and profound view of His vows and practices. From here, each Buddhist is self-aware in the practice, how to properly practice the Dharma to get benefit, peace in the present and soon achieve the wish of Buddhahood in the future.

After the Dharma talk, the mass entered the penitential ritual as usual.