Page 70 - A Study of Traditional Chinese Religions in Malaysia: The Decline and the Path Towards Revitalization

It’s the first experience with Fo Guang Shan. After my mother passed away, I took
my father here because my mother has a ling wei here. It was the first time I followed

the chant and when they started the chant, suddenly I realized that I could follow, I
read the pinyin and did the prayers. Suddenly my heart gave me a message to tell
me this is what I’ve been looking for. That is why I know that this is the path that I’m

looking for. And I started to read Hsing Yun Fa Shi’s books about humanistic
Buddhism... When I started to read these, I realized that these are what I have been

wanting to learn. When I came in, everything fell into place, I was also semi-retired.”
(Helen)

Based on Helen’s sharing, it is evident that she was touched by kindness and compassion
shown to her by Master Ru Xin at Fo Guang Shan when her father was ill in the hospital and

it was a low point of her life. Apart from that, Helen was drawn to the chanting and prayers
that had touched her heart and reading Master Hsing Yun’s books made her feel that
humanistic Buddhism is what she had been looking for. It can be implied that Helen feels

welcomed in Fo Guang Shan and that the teachings of humanistic Buddhism match with
what she had been searching for in a religion.

Steven, too, shared how he began to learn about Buddhism in the following excerpt:

“...until I met Master Hsing Yun, I realized I can feel his loving kindness, his
compassion. So I tell myself, there must be something in Buddhism that I can pick up,

that I can learn from. Then I started reading about Buddhism… Because I’m English
educated, so I don’t read Chinese, I don’t read Mandarin, so I have to go to the
English dharma and then read most of Master Hsing Yun’s books, like what Buddhists

believe and etc.…. I was so touched. … then I know outside, there’s nobody creating
us, it’s we ourselves that create all our troubles, by not being enlightened, so we
create a lot of negative karma, a lot of negative actions that tie us down to these

sufferings. So in a way, I got some truth in the way we live…” (Steven)

Similar to Helen’s experience, Steven was firstly touched by the compassion and kindness
that were shown to him by Master Hsing Yun and he then proceeded to learn more about

Buddhist teachings and beliefs and was subsequently drawn to the Buddhist ways of making
sense of the world around us. It can be seen from Steven’s experience that he feels a sense
of peace and contentment in finding what he perceives as the ‘truth’ and meaning of life in

Buddhism.

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