DEAN SENSUI / DSENSUI@STARBULLETIN.COM
The Rev. Shugen Komagata is senior minister at Soto Mission of Hawaii, a sect which grew from modest sugar plantation roots to its current home in Nuuanu.
Soto Buddhists
celebrate 100 years
in HawaiiCentennial activities will honor
the past but also address the
challenges of the future
Tour buses stopping at Soto Mission of Hawaii at 1708 Nuuanu Ave. this week lingered longer than usual. Besides the traditional group shot on the steps of the landmark temple, the tourists spent time inside chanting together before the ornate golden altar.
It was a pilgrimage stop for 700 Japan visitors here for weekend festivities marking the centennial of the Soto Buddhist sect in Hawaii.
An anticipated crowd of 1,350 people will attend the anniversary banquet tonight at the Sheraton Waikiki Hotel. The hotel will be the center of activities tomorrow, beginning with a 9:30 a.m. service at which 100 candles will be lit.
A symposium at 2 p.m. today in the Kahuku room on "Buddhism Today and Tomorrow: New Era, New Challenges -- with Spirit and Harmony" is free and open to the public.
Panelists are Beatrice Yoshimoto, retired public school music teacher; the Rev. Eric T. Matsumoto of Moiliili Hongwanji Mission; Mary Beth Oshima-Nakade, assistant minister at Daifukuji Soto Mission; and Shuji M. Komagata, a University of Hawaii graduate student in Soto ministry training. University of Hawaii religion professor George Tanabe will be moderator.
"Each will contribute a new vision, something practical and useful that can be applied for our future," said the Rev. Shugen Komagata, senior minister at Soto Mission of Hawaii.
He said that while the centennial will celebrate their history, Soto members today are "future-oriented. We are looking for ways of outreach into the community, to preserve our Buddhist heritage for the next generation. These people are not afraid to speak out on the subject," he said.
Symbolic of the evolution from its tie to Japanese culture is a new hymn to be introduced at the service tomorrow. Soto Mission organist Beatrice Yoshimoto composed "Buddha Embraces All," which, Komagata said, "is chanting of Buddha's holy name with a Hawaiian melody and ukulele accompaniment."
Bishop Shingi Saito, the vice abbot of Soto-shu headquarters in Sojiji, Japan, will participate in services. There are 6 million Soto sect members and 15,000 temples worldwide. In Hawaii there are 2,300 families who attend nine temples on five islands.
The Nuuanu temple, built in the architecture of India, the birthplace of Buddha, was considered an exotic design when built in 1953 to replace an earlier structure. But the history of Soto-shu in Hawaii began in modest wooden houses set up as temples in 1903 on sugar plantations in Waipahu and at Wahiawa camp on Kauai, where contract laborers from Japan gathered to observe the familiar rites from their homeland.
The hardships endured by the first generation are described in the "History of the Soto Sect in Hawaii," published last year under coordination of local Bishop Jiho Machida. It said that when the first ministers came from Japan, their role was often to "console" the immigrant workers who worked long hours under hard conditions.
Over the years, ministers sent here doubled as Japanese-language teachers for the second and third generations.
Like other Buddhist sects, the Soto missions here were closed during World War II by American officials fearing their ties to Japan.
Some people attending the festivities are descendants of the first Soto members.
Komagata is an example of the generational ties. His grandfather, Zenkyo Komagata, was sent as a minister in 1919 and remained until his death in 1973. His father, Zenshu Komagata, began eight years as minister here in 1968. The third generation came to Hawaii at the age of 12 and has been minister since 1970. His son, Shuji, is in ministry training.
The Soto Academy adjoining the temple has 120 "multiethnic, multicultural" students in kindergarten through sixth grade.
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