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YMBA extends support to Mahanayake’s call
View(s):The Colombo Young Men’s Buddhist Association has welcomed the Mahanayaka Theras’s call to issue detailed identity cards for Buddhist monks in a bid to preserve Theravada Buddhism in its pristine form in Sri Lanka.
“Having received information to the effect that the Most Venerable Mahanayake Theras have addressed a memorandum to His Excellency the President, bringing to his notice that there has arisen an urgent need to identify those impostors — though ordained as Buddhist priests and robed in priestly vestments — who are engaged in nefarious and irreligious activities violative of the norms of Monastic Discipline and to take necessary action to excommunicate them from Buddhist priesthood. The YMBA wishes to take this opportunity to offer its appreciative veneration to the Venerable Mahanayake Theras for making this timely and magnanimous proposal to the President,” the association says in a statement.
It says that the task of issuing official identity cards to Bhikkhus and female novices (Sil Mathas) has become an urgent and essential requirement in Sri Lanka which still retains the longstanding reputation as a country that preserves the Theravada Buddhist Tradition in its pristine purity.
The statement hails the Mahanayakes of the three Nikayas for sending the letter to the President and highlighting historic precedents where Sri Lankan kings have acted against miscreant monks in a bid to preserved Buddhism in its pristine form.
The Mahanayake Theras in their letter have pointed out that during the Polonnaruwa period, King Parakramabahu the Great had taken action to excommunicate from the priesthood miscreant Bhikkus who behaved in violation of the norms of monastic discipline and that King Kirthi Sri Rajasinghe, during the Kandyan period, had taken action in a similar manner to preserve the purity of the Buddhist Monastic Order and the stability of the Buddha Sasana in Sri Lanka.
“While cherishing our earnest hope and expectation that this paramount task aimed at safeguarding the security of the Venerable Maha Sanga, who are performing a monumental service in preserving the sublime teachings of the Supreme Buddha and the stability of Theravada Buddhism in Sri Lanka, would receive the earliest attention of His Excellency the President, we take this opportunity to assure, with a feeling of utmost dedication towards Buddhism in Sri Lanka, the maximum support that the Colombo Young Men’s Buddhist Association can extend towards successful accomplishment of this noble task.”