人間菩提 20150416教之慇實勤造福

無量光曜心 文章總數 : 2487 威望 : 33 注冊日期 : 2012-11-03

人間菩提 20150416教之慇實勤造福Caring for the Earth and Helping People in Need

See how a sandstorm has shrouded everything in dust. It is not only bad for people’s health, but also causes great inconvenience to people’s everyday life.

We also see garbage problems.People nowadays lead a better life, but they also create a lot of garbage, which not only piles up on the land, but also pollutes shorelines.

Around ten tons of garbage come from the ocean every day. The currents wash them to the store of Kinmen.

There are two high tides each day. After we’ve cleaned up, the next tide washes new trash ashore.

Most of the garbage is plastic waste, which is not biodegradable and will cause great harm to the environment. See how Tzu Chi recycling volunteers put their hearts into safeguarding the Earth with love. Isn’t recycling an effort worth encouraging?

Look at the recyclables we’ve collected at our recycling stations. Many of them are not biodegradable and will harm our environment when buried in landfills.

But when they are recycled, they become very valuable as they can then be remade into many other quality and useful things. We see our educational recycling station in Neihu, Taipei. Seeing how our volunteers incorporated technology into their exhibitions there, I’m both impressed and moved.

One volunteer there, Mr. Lin.Although environmental protection is not his major, he often serves as a docent at our recycling station there.

Please feed the cow. Is this its food? Yes. The cow on the screen is dancing. It just ate, so it is happy. How come it is still hungry? Let’s feed it again.

One more?Its stomach swells and it farts. When it farts, it releases methane, which is a major global warming culprit.

See, this is what they’ve designed. They also set up a device for people to see how plastic bottles can be recycled. The device is a simplified version of an actual machine. After plastic bottles are shredded, the pieces can be made into pellets, they can be spun into fiber.When we pour pellets into the device, they can be spun into fiber.

When 72 strands of spun fibers are twisted together, they form yarn. This is what people can see and learn at our recycling station. Thanks to technology, what people consider as garbage can now be remade into many useful things.

Our volunteers are really very mindful. They try their best to let people learn more about recycling. They don’t hold anything back, but share what they know with everyone.

At a place as simple as our recycling station, they can show people the profound principles behind our resources and how they can be recycled and reused. This is what they share with everyone.

They hope everyone can understand, so they don’t hide anything from people. At my Dharma talk this morning, I spoke of how the Buddha shared the same teaching no matter how many people were listening.

He treated everyone equally no matter if they were rich or poor.All he wanted was to share what he knew with everyone. Aren’t our volunteers also the same? To promote recycling, they need to let everyone understand first.

So, be it children, adults, or even entrepreneurs coming to our recycling station, they explain everything in a way that they can understand. Depending on their audience, they decide what they’re going to say.I really can’t praise them enough.

This is how they work with one heart for the Earth and all humanity. Are they doing the right or wrong thing? I’m sure everyone has their own judgment.All we hope is that the Earth and people in the world can enjoy peace and safety.

In this world, there are many people living in poverty.Take the Bedouin in Jordan for example.Many of them are poor and suffer helplessly. So, Tzu Chi volunteers in Jordan often travel hundreds of kilometers to the desert to give out aid to the needy.

Every child we see is very adorable. But they live in poor and helpless conditions. Fortunately, there are loving people caring for them. There are many wealthy people in world. If they can be more frugal in their daily living, they can save a lot of what they have to share with the poor.

If everyone could do so, how wonderful it would be. We truly hope that everyone can enjoy peace, safety, and good health, and our society can be harmonious. This will be a true blessing for everyone.

People should always help one another--- In a mountain village in Indonesia, there is a suspension bridge over a river with rushing waters. The bridge is in poor condition.

When children cross it to go to school, it sways, which is very dangerous. So, Tzu Chi volunteers decided to build a bridge for them. Learning of that, the Indonesian military were very supportive.They said they also wanted to help and would provide manpower to help build the bridge.

See how everyone lent a hand of their own accord and came together to build the bridge. Even the military pitched in to help. Seeing how the military, the locals, and Tzu Chi volunteers work together for the people in the mountain, I truly admire them for what they do.

Love brings people a sense of blessing. With hearts united by love, we can work hand in hand for a common good cause. Everyone can give money or effort to help others. When we give of ourselves, we’ll gain great joy in return.This is true for everyone. As long as we give, we’ll be filled with joy.

無量光曜心 文章總數 : 2487 威望 : 33 注冊日期 : 2012-11-03

20150417人間菩提 ~ 誠心戒慎‧關懷天下Living with Vigilant Care and Sincere Piety

From the news we see that poor air quality has affected some areas in Taiwan. This is truly very worrying. As I often say, living in this world, we are all interconnected and we all breathe the same air.

Buddhism speaks of the four elements. In fact, there are five---In addition to earth, water, fire, and air, there is also the fifth element of space, which refers to the space of the universe. In the space of the universe, the air circulates around. So, it’s not that if you live in an area without any factories, the air you breathe is clean. It’s not so, because air flows around.

Taiwan is now suffering from water shortage, which has brought much inconvenience to many people in their daily living. So, please use water sparingly.

For decades, I’ve been calling on everyone to cherish water. But my words carry little weight. So, what I’ve said has little effect despite my effort to encourage people to save water for so many years. That said, I’m very grateful to many Tzu Chi volunteers who have been reusing water for different purposes for a very long time. What they do is truly praise worthy. If everyone can conserve water by reusing it many times like that, a lot of water can be saved.

The government of Taiwan is now calling on people to save water and electricity and even offering incentives to people who do just that. The government’s intention is very good but cherishing resources is our job and we shouldn’t do that for rewards.

Everyone should save water so we can go through this difficult time together. We should think in the long term, but not be short sighted. The government’s intention is to remind us of the problem so we’ll be aware and cautious of our actions.

We should know that water resources of the Earth are limited. When it doesn’t rain and there isn’t enough water to use many people will pump underground water. But water is limited. It’s best that everyone can live with vigilant care and sincere piety.

By that, I mean we should take good care of our minds, follow life’s principles to do good, have respect for ourselves and others, and keep our actions in check in our everyday life. We should think about how we can best use our resources so we won’t overuse them and keep wasting them away. This is what we should constantly remind ourselves to do and mindfully cherish the resources we have.

We also see how our doctors dedicate themselves to safeguarding people’s lives with respect. In Taichung, a five-year-old girl suffers from a rare condition. To pay for her medical bill, her father had to sell their house because the shots she got were not covered by the national health insurance.

Learning her condition, we gave the family a financial aid of NT$400,000 (around US$12,800). Our doctors from Tzu Chi Hospital in Taichung also went to visit the family. They found that the girl’s grandfather is also ill. So, they asked him to go to our hospital for a thorough checkup.

This is how our doctors care for people with respect. Such love and respect is what we should inspire in everyone because the world we live in now is filled with much impurity which has worried many people.
Looking back to over ten years ago, there were the 911 attacks in 2001, the Iraq War in 2003, and the SARs outbreak also in 2003.

During those years, these incidents had indeed worried people around the world. That’s why I began expounding the Water Repentance text and encouraging everyone to repent deeply from their hearts.

I spent five years expounding the Water Repentance text. Throughout the years, we’ve been many disasters around the world, showing us that the world is indeed filled with much impurity.

How are we to eliminate the impurity from our world? At least we can start with changing our lifestyles through reducing our carbon emissions and conserving energy by saving water and electricity. Only then can we help to mitigate disasters in the world. Moreover, we should not create more impurity through our unwholesome words and deeds, which will only bring fear to people’s minds and lead to dangerous consequences.

We see also a little Syrian girl who raised her arms to surrender as she mistook a camera for a gun. See how they live in fear like this.

What suffering it is. So, we must work to calm and purify people’s minds. Only when people’s minds are peaceful can there be harmony in society.

Every day, we pay close attention to events happening around the world. Thanks to modern technology, someone who has a tight daily schedule like me can learn about world events in a very short time. So, I am very grateful to our Dai Ai News for allowing me to see what’s happening around the world every day.

The disasters I see remind me not to slack off. They also remind me that time is running out, but we still have much work to do. Time keeps ticking away second by second and we can never ask for one second more. What we can do is to seize every second and live it to the fullest.