Aloha to the Spirits

Lantern floating and Six Billion Paths to Peace event remind us that we are never alone

by Mark Glinski

There are six billion paths to peace. At least one of them is by water.

Twenty-thousand-plus spectators felt any number of emotions as they witnessed the annual Memorial Day lantern floating ceremony at Ala Moana Beach Park on the island of Oahu, Hawaii. You could hear their cheers. You could see their eyes welling with tears. But to stand among them on the shore and watch more than 700 wood-and-paper lanterns drift out to the calm, open sea, each one a small, flickering halo against the dark, blue sky, was to feel one particular emotion, peace. 

It was the peace of harmonized opposites: light and darkness, fire and water. It was the peace that comes with letting go, for to watch those lanterns slowly recede into the night horizon was to know a sense of release.

"You feel that release on a gut level," said attending dignitary Coralie Matayoshi, CEO of the Hawaiian Chapter of the American Red Cross. "You release your love and thoughts along with that person who has passed. You follow them until they disappear."

It was also the peace of communion. Each lantern was inscribed with the name of a departed loved one or ancestor at the request of a spectator who wished to revere their memory. But the lantern floating ceremony wasn't just about communion with spirits of the dead. When those tiny lights vanished in the night, the spectators could then turn amongst themselves and honor the spirits of the living.

"When the lanterns are released, we are honoring the dead," said attending dignitary Calvin K.Y. Say, Speaker of the house for the State of Hawaii. "In return, they share their spirits with each and everyone of us, and we share our spirits with each other."

New meanings for old traditions

That feeling of peace and communion has lent new meaning to Memorial Day, a holiday born of war. For the past nine years, Hawaii's Na Lei Aloha foundation has set this day aside for the lantern floating, which began centuries ago as a Buddhist ritual. In its native Japan, "Toro nagashi" is conducted in rivers between mid-July and mid-August to guide the spirits of the dead to the other world.

Members of the lay, esoteric Buddhist order Shinnyo-en, led by spiritual head Archbishop Shinso Ito, marked these religious origins as they conducted rites preceding the release of the lanterns on the Pacific Ocean. These rites actually began one day earlier at the Shinnyo-en Hawaii Temple in Honolulu. There, Archbishop Ito performed the Water Consolatory service, inviting ancestral spirits to come forth and offering them libations of rice and water in preparation for their sea voyage.

While these specific, religious elements remain essential, the lantern floating has come to take on a broad spiritual and humanistic significance that you don't have to be a Buddhist to appreciate. Staged on a Hawaiian beach known as Magic Island and framed with exquisite performances of native music and dance, the pageant has also become a celebration of Hawaiian culture.

And then there's that deep feeling of peace. It first hits in a spontaneous moment of silence just before the start of the festivities. And it lingers at the end as the lanterns float away. For many of the attendees, the lantern floating is, quite simply, an invocation for peace. This was just as true for the robed celebrants of Shinnyo-en themselves, who regard the propagation of peace as part of their service to the world.

"If Shinnyo-en can communicate its message to the world, there will be peace in our lifetime," Say affirmed.

Peace through service

World peace is also an agenda topper for the Shinnyo-en Foundation. On May 29, one day after the lantern floating, the foundation held its second Six Billion Paths to Peace awards ceremony and forum at the Hawaii Prince Hotel Waikiki in Honolulu, walking distance from Magic Island. The foundation's first such event also coincided with a major Buddhist rite. The inaugural Six Billion Paths forum and ceremony took place one day after Shinnyo-en's first-ever public Saito Homa fire purification in Yorba Linda, California. As with the lantern floating, Saito Homa took on meanings beyond its religious traditions and became, for all present, a prayer for peace.

The Six Billion Paths events gain a certain energy from these powerful rites. And in the case of the Hawaii forum, the lantern floating provided a vivid illustration of what was discussed during the forum panel, "Exploring the Role of Service in Culture, Religion, and Spirituality," moderated by Shinnyo-en Foundation Program Officer Liane Louie-Badua, Ph.D. All three panelists had attended the lantern floating. If the cultural, religious, and spiritual aspects of the ritual were self-evident, so was the notion that the ritual was an act of service. It served the spirits of departed ancestors by according them reverence. In turn, it also served the living participants by giving them a chance to remember loved ones, to say "goodbye," to heal.

The lantern floating demonstrated that service is never a one-side proposition. So concurred panelist McClellan Hall, executive director of the National Indian Youth Leadership Project. During the panel, Hall remarked that his work with native children through the United States has exposed him to many indigenous languages. But despite their wide diversity, certain core concepts are common to all of them, such as the
double-side nature of service.

"In every language I came across, there are terms that describe people's reciprocal responsibility," said Hall, who is of Cherokee ancestry. He added that the Cherokee language has its own such word, gadugi.

"It refers to people coming together to help each other. Cherokee elders use this word in ancient songs. It's an old-Cherokee word, but they're bringing it back," said Hall. 

Paying it forward

For fellow-panelist Dr. Joseph Bobrow, a clinical psychologist and Zen master, service is not so much a cultural imperative as it is an urge innate in the human psyche.

"The desire to be of service is as natural as the desire to learn," said Bobrow during the panel.

Bobrow has been gratified to see this desire emerging in those who have just received service. He directs the Coming Home Project, which provides therapy, meditation training, and other rehabilitative assistance to veterans returning from Afghanistan and Iraq. During the panel, he mentioned his "amazing discovery" that veterans who have received emotional support become eager to help someone else.

"When you create a safe place of unconditional love, what gets unleashed is people's natural desire to give support. It's a sleeper element of healing," said Bobrow.

The other panel member, Paulie K. Jennings, executive producer of the World Invitational Hula Festival, witnessed a stunning demonstration of service that changed her life.  During the Hungarian Revolution in 1956, she volunteered with the Austrian Red Cross to help escort Hungarian child refugees to safety in Vienna. On the bus bound for Austria, she saw a boy, newly orphaned by the violence of the revolution, comforting a distraught little girl and giving her water.

"At that moment, I thought, 'This is our future.'" said Jennings during the panel.

Jennings considers it the mission of her organization to "preserve Hawaiian culture through hula."  She regards herself as a cultural ambassador, "giving back to the world what I have learned." Teaching the world about hula goes much further than explaining the steps and movements of the dance. It is an education in Hawaiian history, aesthetics, and appreciation for nature. It is an illumination of the collective Hawaiian soul, which is nothing if not open and welcoming.

"Hawaii is the most isolated civilization in the world," said Jennings. "Of course there's a constant influx of foreign entities, but the spirit of Aloha prevails."

The Aloha essence

For anyone unfamiliar with the concept of the Aloha spirit, the lantern floating resonated with it. After the Shinnyo-en Taiko drummers opened the pageant with a rousing performance, Hawaiian vocalist Natalie Ai Kamauu sang a poignant, slow-swaying ballad in her lilting style. Apropos of the lantern floating and its emphasis on ancestors, she explained to the attendees that the Hawaiian lyrics were about her grandmother and the stories she used to tell her.

"She is the sweetest blossom I have ever known," she said.

Kamauu then performed a lively song with an ensemble of young girls in native costume who mimed gracefully and expressively in accompaniment. Afterward, another Hawaiian performer took the stage: singer, songwriter, and slack key guitar master Keola Beamer. He, in turn, honored his grandfather in song, saying that the man "gave me my love for Hawaiian music." Beamer reminisced about "listening to the wind" with his grandfather and then said, "His spirit sails across the Pacific with many loved ones, embraced by the soft beautiful sound of the wind." Beamer sang tenderly and accompanied himself with the glistening strains of his guitar.

His wife, Moana, blew a wooden instrument that simulated the sound of the wind. The couple then sang a second ballad together.

Kamauu returned to the stage and joined the Beamers for one more song, accompanied by hula dancers. The sinking sun lingered over the Pacific as if to catch every last note, every last drop of Aloha.

The spirits embark at sunset

But the sky turned gold and orange in the west when the conch shell blower in native Hawaiian costume heralded the start of the ritual. The University of Hawai'i Orchestra struck up a fanfare. Young men carried the six "parent" lantern boats to the platform and set them on a long table.  Inscribed with the names of Shinnyo-en's founders and members of the Hawaiian monarchy, these larger boats would serve as guides for the others. The paper walls of each lantern glowed from its interior candle, lit from the eternal Shinnyo flame.

One by one, the Shinnyo-en celebrants strode toward the stage in shimmering blue, green, and violet robes, each slung with a long golden sash. Archbishop Ito was the last to ascend the platform in her blazing orange robe. Women in silver/blue gowns followed at a distance, strewing flower petals in her wake.

Archbishop Ito warmly greeted the attendees in Japanese. The English translation of her comments flashed on a Jumbotron screen.

"Just as the lanterns glow with a gentle light," she said, "the members of Shinnyo-en also wish to be a light for others, one that can bring hope to the world through our continued efforts to do good and benefit others." Archbishop Ito concluded her address with a charming "Thank you very much" in English.

As the responding applause subsided, a bell tolled sharply once, signifying the start of solemnities. Archbishop Ito conducted more consolatory rites, purifying the space for the arrival of the spirits about to embark on the sea. As a vocal ensemble performed a stylized, polyphonic arrangement of traditional chants, accompanied by cello and percussion, Archbishop Ito's assisting celebrants poured libations of rice and water into crystal vessels. Behind them, tiny candle lights grew into one long, flickering string, as hundreds of lantern bearers assembled along the beach.

The rites having been concluded, the young men bore the parent lantern boats to the beach, where volunteers in canoes gently coaxed them out onto the ocean. The smaller lanterns followed slowly, forming a long, drifting chain of auras . As attendees craned their necks to follow their departure, clouds of incense poured out of elevated vents, and the Shinnyo drummers pounded out an emphatic farewell. The orchestra and chorus segued with swirling recessional music, as Archbishop Ito and the other celebrants left the stage. Only streaks of gold remained in the ever-darkening sky.

One last touch of Aloha remained to conclude the pageant. The orchestra and chorus struck up the anthem Hawaii Aloha. The attendees all joined hands, and many sang along. The sky was now an even, deep blue. The better to see the lanterns, which had grown tiny in the distance.

Religion without borders

Afterward, Bishop Dwight Nakamura of the Jodo Mission of Hawaii, another attending dignitary, reflected on what the pageant had meant to him.

"My niece passed away. In memory of her, I wanted to participate," said

Bishop Nakamura, "It is very emotional. It touches me deeply."

Bishop Nakamura is ordained in the Jodo shu sect of Japanese Buddhism, which conducts similar services to those seen in the lantern floating but in a different manner. Such differences could not prevent Bishop Nakamura from feeling a spiritual connection with what he had just experienced. Incidentally, his late niece was a member of Shinnyo-en.

Though the lantern floating incorporated specific religious practices, this religion expressed itself as being very open, without borders of exclusivity. Coralie Matayoshi put it best: "It transcends languages and cultures." It is interesting to note that the word "En" in the name "Shinnyo-en" is translated as "garden without borders."

This sense of borderless religion was also in the air during the Six Billion Paths to Peace forum and ceremony, and not just because the panel discussion featured a master of Zen Buddhism and a protegé of Cherokee tribal elders. The program opened with representatives of the Volunteer Resource Center of Hawaii from Communities in Schools program performing soulful oli chants in their native Hawaiian language. The first chant was a prayer for insight, knowledge, and the ability to look beneath the surface.

The second was a prayer for "love that doesn't choke us." Immediately afterward, a speaker recited a prayer from a very different tradition and a very different part of the world: the Prayer of Saint Francis. Nothing seemed out of place.

Prayers, poetry, and personal journeys

The first line of the prayer of Saint Francis is "Make me an instrument of your peace." As the Six Billion Paths program continued, it was quite evident that there were many instruments of peace in that room.

Performers from the Oakland, California-based Destiny Arts Center a presented a modern  dance/poetry recital about peace. These teenage artists moved and spoke as if their lives depended on their message being true:

"Peace is burning within every child's soul from the moment they are born…

My path to peace is windy and twisting through fire and ice."

Their conviction may come from the fact that they themselves are the product of a peace initiative. The mission of Destiny Arts is nothing less than to "end isolation, prejudice and violence in the lives of young people."

Mentorship and creative activity are central to this effort. One of the great successes of Destiny Arts is not just that teenagers discover their artistic potential, but that they, themselves, become mentors and teachers to other children. The teenagers are liberated from the rut of urban violence, but with this liberation comes responsibility—the reciprocal nature of service.

They accept the responsibility gladly. As one of the artists, nicknamed "Nee Nee," eloquently put it, "Destiny Arts makes you realize that you represent destiny."

The Six Billion Paths program featured two other teenage success stories. The Shinnyo-en Foundation presented a Presidential Service Award to Naohito Miura, a senior at Roosevelt High School in Honolulu. Miura works with his school's Red Cross program to teach small children how to swim, a valuable thing to know when you live on an island, surrounded by water.

"I get them used to the water. I teach them how to kick and other stuff," said Miyora with a shy grin. "It makes me feel good to see them smile and to hear their parents' gratitude."

Aspiring teacher Leilani Perkins received the second Presidential Service Award. A second-year college student in Honolulu, Perkins is not waiting for graduation to practice her vocation. She has already donated countless hours of her free time toward helping younger students with their schoolwork. Teaching is not just her chosen career; it is truly her path to peace.

"Working with students has helped me find out who I am and find peace within myself," said Perkins in her acceptance speech.

Honoring ancestors, cherishing children

After Shinnyo-en Foundation Executive Director Harumitsu Inouye handed Perkins her award, her mother, grandmother, and her "aunties" placed leis on her shoulders and a wreath on her head. Perkins later explained to one non-Hawaiian that an "aunty" doesn't have to be a blood relative to be a member of one's family. The family bond, so fundamentally important to Hawaiian society, was one of the major touchstones of the panel discussion.

Jennings attributed her penchant for service to her Hawaiian roots. She fondly recalled her mother admonishing her to pitch in and help out with whatever needed to get done in the household. Bobrow spoke of how the roots of his sense of responsibility to serve "go back to family" and his "socially conscious parents." It is not surprising that one of the concepts that attracted him to Buddhism as a young man was that of the Bodhisatva.

"This is an enlightened being who takes it upon himself to help others become enlightened," explained Bobrow. "He doesn't just chew his own cud and enjoy his bliss for himself."

Hall continues to seek guidance from his Cherokee elders in all aspects of his life. But one particular thing they told him decades ago put him on his vocational path to help native youth.

"The Elders performed a ritual where they looked into the future. They could see a time approaching when we would lose our youth," said Hall. "It seemed to me, I could either give up or try to do something."

It was with this emphasis on teaching and serving youth that the Six Billion Paths To Peace program seemed to balance out the lantern floating. While one event honored ancestry, the other cherished children and future generations. Not surprisingly, the mistress of ceremonies for the Six Billion Paths program was another teacher by vocation, Angela Baraquio Grey, the 2001 Miss America. Prior to winning her crown, Baraquio Grey taught high school. Now, she chairs her self-named educational foundation, which promotes character building in Hawaiian communities. During and after the program, she gratefully acknowledged the Shinnyo-en Foundation for the support it has provided her organization.

"As the mother of two children, I do what I need to be my highest self," she said. "I am honored and fortunate to have the help of like-minded people, like the foundation. We are all pushing forward to a higher goal."

Parallel paths to peace

The Shinnyo-en Foundation doesn't just ask people to name their own path to peace. It challenges them to walk that path. And it helps them on the way. Numerous individuals and organizations with altruistic missions were guests at the Six Billion Paths to Peace event. Some had long-standing, mutually beneficial relationships with the foundation, such as the Na Lei Aloha Foundation, the Volunteer Resource Center of Hawaii, and Destiny Arts.

For many invitees, the event provided illumination and inspiration to stay on their paths to peace, which are not always easy to tread.

"I can't say enough about the Shinnyo-en Foundation," said Jennings after the forum. "We try to connect Hawaii with the rest of the world by teaching hula. The foundation understands how hard that is, and how important it is."

Corinne Ching, member of the Hawaii House of Representatives, said she had learned a lot from the forum panelists that would help her in her work with the legislative body's  Heritage Caucus, which she founded. The caucus is dedicated to preserving Hawaii's historical and cultural landmarks, such as its palaces.

"I'm reminded that we're doing this preservation work for our children, not just to teach them about history, but to teach them about grace," said Ching.

She also reflected on something that Baraquio Grey said to conclude the program.

"She said that peace is daily thing. Everything we do, every time we speak, we have an opportunity to create peace," said Ching. "I'm taking that home with me."

Ching and several of her fellow legislators presented an award to the Shinnyo-en Foundation, acknowledging its many services to the State of Hawaii and its communities.

Joe Matsuoka, Dean of the School of Social Work at the University of Hawaii, noted how events like the Six Billion Paths to Peace forum brings together like-minded people who can encourage and educate each other.

"We're all doing critical work, and it's critical for us to affirm each other's work," said Matsuoka. "When we have a dialogue like this, we can address parallel needs and exchange information and resources."

This was another theme common to the lantern floating and Six Billion Paths to Peace: We are never alone. The lantern floating reminds us that our ancestors are always with us. The forum reminds us that there are many people around us to provide help when we need it, just as there are many opportunities for us to help others.