Inauguration of New Campus

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A With no thought of pride or glory, We with utmost humility, we resolve to make better the world we live in to promote our Sasana (Teaching of the Buddha), to the best of our ability. ABOUT SITAGU BUDDHISM MISSIONARY MINISTRY ACADEMICS STUDENTS LEARNING CENTER EXAM CENTER NEWS & INFO CONTACT US resolve to make and effort to beautify our lives in this world we live in, to promote our Sasana ardently, and to make our country prosperous, to the best of our ability but without arrogance. Home News & Info Inauguration of New Campus
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Inauguration of New Campus of Sitagu International Buddhist Academy (Yangon)

Speech delivered by
Dr. Ashin Nyanissara (Ph.D., D.Litt.)

Good morning! Mr. President, Vice President of Republic of Union of Myanmar, Your Excellencies and Ministers, Excellencies, Ambassadors of many countries, Ladies and gentle men! I am very happy, very glad in this great occasion of inauguration of our (opening) ceremony, Sitagu International Buddhist Academy in Yangon (2011). I founded Sitagu International Buddhist Academy in Sagaing Hills, which is the main campus, since fifteen years ago. We are contributing the Teachings of Lord Buddha to international students as well as national students. Mostly our academic students are Theravada Buddhist monks from Theravada Buddhist countries, Thailand, Lao, Cambodia and Sri Lanka. Most of students are Myanmar (Burmese). I opened a new campus of Sitagu International Buddhist Academy in Mandalay Hills (2009), at the foot of Mandalay hills, which is affiliated from the main campus, Sagaing. Now we open a new campus of Sitagu International Buddhist Academy in Yangon (2011), which is the second affiliated campus. In other countries, I saw many academies, for example, navy academy, air-force academy, military academy, defense academy, etc. In the world today, in the Buddhist world also, we must establish Buddhist academy. In this Buddhist academy we are teaching Theravada Buddhist Scriptures (Theravada Buddhist teachings). In our academy we founded the department of Vinaya, codes of Discipline, department of Suttanta, discourses, department of Abhidhamma, Buddhist Philosophy, department of Missionary and Religion, comparative study of religions, most important department is the department of Meditation. Meditation is very wonderful technique. In this morning I would like to interpret what does meditation mean. Meditation means a technique how to train our mind to be cultured, how to train our mind to be polite and how to search for the realistic nature and true nature within ourselves. According to Buddhist Philosophical stand point as long as we do not realize the true nature and realistic nature within ourselves, we can't solve the problems of our life. So, to solve the problems of our life, we must learn meditation, we must train meditation. It is not for religious purpose and religion for worship. Meditation is for mental training or spiritual training. Therefore, in our Buddhist Academy, the department of meditation is most important department. We are running the above six departments. For the diploma students, they have to study for three years. For the B.A, under graduate students, they have to study another four years. For the Master Degree, post graduate students, they have to study and write their dissertation for two years. And then they can upgrade their academic study with their Ph.D. This is very brief information of Sitagu International Buddhist Academy. Now all of my dear brothers and sisters, ladies and gentle men, your Excellencies, our Lord Buddha, after his enlightenment he lived as a Buddha for forty-five years. At the age of eighty (580 BC), he passed away. Within forty-five years, what the Buddha taught? He taught only Dhamma. Dhamma is a very wonderful teaching taught by the Buddha himself. It is not a kind of religious system but it is a system to learn, to practice, to train, to realize for those who are keen to turn a new leaf of life. This is very brief meaning of the Dhamma. Our Sitagu International Buddhist academy is teaching, learning, training, practicing to realize what I am, where I am, what I have to do. These three main points are very important to understand. This is called right understanding to convert from evil to noble. Therefore, Dhamma is the mighty technique to solve the problems of mankind.

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Inauguration of New Campus

http://sitagucenter.org/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&i...

Many religious leaders, many political leaders, many social leaders, organize and form, reform many organizations in order to solve the problems of their respective nation. For example, United Nation is a unique example in the world. But unity and diversity, diversity and unity, love and hate, hate and love, association and separation, etc., are unavoidable dualism in the world. Nobody can find out ultimate solution of a nation in the world today. Science and technology also never can find out the solution of the spirituality and they can search, research the solution of material only. But these science and technology can never reach to the end of the solution of the problems of in the world, repeatedly researching latest solutions, but there is no latest solution in the world today. Your Excellencies, ladies and gentle men! The world of living being is composed of both, mind and matter. One of the Buddha's message, I would like to contribute this morning "Mano Pubbangama dhamma" very beautiful words of the Buddha. Mind is forerunner, mind makes everything, mind mould human life, mind is the master of a man. Human beings are architecture of their own life. So, in order to create a beautiful life, we should train our mind to be beautiful. This is called 'meditation'. Now-a-day the whole world is full of the kills, full of the evils, full of battle, full of crime, full of the sorrows, full of the suffering. These unpleasant situations and miserable events are generated by the evil mind, wicked mind. In many Buddha's messages, it is mentioned that the starting point of this miserable event is selfish, thought of ego centric world. The beginning of a competition or a conflict is the thought of jealousy and unhappy of the other's progress and other's success. Therefore, the Buddha emphatically stated that you should exert to convert your mind from selfishness to selflessness, from jealousy to joy, from evil to noble. The message of the Buddha is absolutely tolerance. And in-tolerance is the greatest enemy of all human beings. The Buddha advised his disciples not to become angry, not to be discontent, even not to be displeased when the other spoke of ill. In the Buddha's teachings, if you show displeasure you will not bring yourself into happiness, you will bring yourself only into the danger of spiritual law. Do not be angry but develop your loving-kindness. This is a very wonderful Buddha's message. The tolerance is the foundations of a unity and peace, another one of his profound message is to exercise the loving-kindness to every living-being making no distinction, whosoever. He clearly stated that loving-kindness and tolerance are the foundations for brotherhood spirit of all nations and all religions. This universal brotherhood spirit of loving-kindness, bondless compassion and great tolerance will break down all barriers separating one nation from another. If we all followers have different faith, because of different faith, different believe, different idea, if we could not meet on a common platform like brothers and sisters, this is simply because we belong to different religion, then surely the noble religious leaders would have failed. Noble religious leaders also would have failed to work our noble missionary and ministry services to humanity. Your Excellencies! Therefore, we all national leaders and religious leaders try to remove such evil spirits of internal enemies of everyone from respective religious stand point. To solve the common problems of all nations, therefore, we should build the common platform to work together. These are our common platform which is the thought of selflessness, the thought of compassion, the thought of tolerance, the thought of right understanding what we are, where we are, what we have to do. Your Excellencies, ladies and gentle men! What we are now doing is establishing of the academy, Buddhist Academy, we invite all of the Buddhist students from various countries, and different faiths to come gather and together to learn, to practice, and to train our wicked mind to be noble and to turn a new leaf of our life from evil to noble. I would like to cordially invite all of my dear brothers and sisters, to come our academy to learn. Especially today I would like to announce for the lay people, not only for Buddhist monk-students and nun-students, we going to offer a course 'The Fundamental Buddhism' to lay people. We are now preparing a curriculum how to teach lay people, how to train lay people to give the best service to the man-kind. Anyone can come and study here in the morning. We are going to open morning classes for lay people. This is our brief information and short information and the purpose why I open Buddhist Academy in Yangon. All of my dear brothers and sisters, ladies and gentle men, especially, Excellencies, our Vice President of the Republic of the Union of Myanmar, and other Ministers, I am very happy and glad to come and join in this great grand opening ceremony of our Buddhist academy. May all of you be peaceful! May all of you be happy! May all of you be successful in any attempts for all of the nations! Dr. Ashin Nyanissara (Ph.D., D.Litt.) Aggamahapandita, Aggamahasaddhammajotikadhaja, The Chancellor of Sitagu International Buddhist Academy The Chairman of International Theravada Buddhist Universities

May the Sublime Dhamma prevail in its pristine purity in every corner of the world.

May the sublime Dhamma prevail in its pristine purity. May all beings be happy and peaceful.

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