20141107人間菩提 ~ 健康素食‧成就志業 Eating Vegetarian and Giving with Love
“What are you cooking?” “Seaweed and tofu soup.” “Why don’t we make meat dishes?” “Because we should respect all life” “I hope my mom and dad can eat a lot of vegetables and many people in the world can eat vegetarian.” “If you love your mom, you should love the moms of animals. If you love your kids, you should love the kids of animals.” “How should we love animals? “Don’t eat them.”
“She likes to eat cabbages and mushrooms. She is a natural vegetarian. Dark-colored vegetables are her favorites, such as mushrooms, seaweed, etc. Eating vegetarian makes us healthier. When we fall ill, we’ll recover soon as our body has become stronger.”
Look at these young children. They not only eat vegetarian themselves, but have also influenced their parents to eat vegetarian as well. Indeed, a vegetarian diet is good for our health and the environment. Look at how greenhouse gases have led to global warming, which has further disrupted Nature’s elements and caused disasters to occur frequently.
Some people say that vegetarian foods contain too many additives and are often either too salty or too sweet, greasy, etc. That’s why some vegetarians even have high blood pressure. In fact, a healthy vegetarian diet can help people with hypertension. As long as we do not eat food that is deep-fried or too salty and sweet and only have whole foods that we prepare at home, we can enjoy very good health. But see how people nowadays often eat out and inevitably consume many additives in food.
If we do not have a proper diet, what we eat won’t help us much. So, to really help ourselves become healthier, we need to eat vegetarian. Also, we should eat more at home. Homemade dishes are healthiest. What we eat matters a lot. So, if everyone could live a simpler life and eat vegetarian, it would be so much better to our health and the environment.
Nowadays, there are indeed many disasters. In Italy, heavy rainfall has caused flooding in a city. Several areas are inundated. See how helpless those affected are. This disaster has reminded me of Typhoon Haiyan, which made landfall in the Philippines on Nov 8, 2013 causing widespread devastation there. In the aftermath, Tzu Chi volunteers in the Philippines and Taiwan quickly went to help. Our volunteers in over 40 countries and regions also worked hard to fundraise for those affected.
Here in Taiwan, many Tzu Chi volunteers gathered at our chapters in Sanxia and Houli to help prepare construction materials for the temporary classrooms we’d build in disaster areas so children there could resume their studies soon. Everyone worked day and night.
There are many touching stories to share. What they did has left a legacy in Tzu Chi’s history. Be it our female or male volunteers, young and old alike, everyone pitched in to help. Tzu Chi volunteers in other parts of Taiwan also went to lend a hand. Such an act of love is truly very moving to see.
Now, in the Philippines, although many Tzu Chi volunteers are busy building temporary houses for Haiyan survivors, our volunteers in Manila have not forgotten to visit their long-term aid recipients. See how they not only brought material supplies to a family, but also a wheelchair. During their first visit, they saw that the father of this family had his leg amputated, so he can’t work to support his family. Because of that, the family is in need. This time, Tzu Chi volunteers brought him a wheelchair and they hoped that he can find work to help support his family again.
There is also a single-parent family with a child suffering from cerebral palsy. With an ill daughter to care for, how can the mother find work to make a living? Seeing that, my heart truly goes out to them. Apart from giving people help, our volunteers also teach them to recycle. See how one of our aid recipients has started to collect plastic bottles. This is how we care for those in need and guide them with love. Not only do we give them material aid, we also share wholesome practices with them.
We also see that in Pingdong County, Taiwan, there are five schools that require rebuilding. In many classrooms, steel bars are exposed and ceilings are falling off. Yet, students are still studying inside. It is truly frightening to see. As Taiwan is prone to earthquakes, we decided to help rebuild these five schools in Pingdong County so children of these schools can study in safe and sturdy classrooms.
On Oct 27, the construction of these five schools broke ground. I hope that in two of three years, we can complete rebuilding all of these five schools. I’m grateful to our volunteer, Mr. Jiang, for taking charge of this project.
Before the old buildings were torn down, we first had to build temporary classrooms for them. Although called temporary, they’ve very sturdy for children to study in so their education won’t be disrupted. These temporary classrooms can also be taken down and reused in the future. This is what Tzu Chi volunteers do to help our children in Taiwan.
I hoped that in two to three years, the students will have sturdy schools to go to and learn diligently so they can become useful members of society when they grow up. All this takes time as well as everyone’s love.
首頁 