SEPTEMBER 2026
LESSONS FROM SOPHEA AT OHIGAN
In September we observe the Autumn equinox in a service known as Ohigan. As the hours of day and night become equal, we reflect on balance in our lives and seek to recommit ourselves to a Buddhist life, looking to the Six Paramitas (or Perfections) for guidance. These include ethical conduct, patience, diligence, meditation, wisdom, and what is top of mind: selfless giving, or dana in Sanskrit.
If you’re like me, a foolish bonbu unable to even fathom enlightenment through my own efforts, doing anything perfectly, let alone giving selflessly, seems pretty impossible!
Luckily, Jodo Shinshu reminds us that our spiritual liberation is assured through entrusting in the immeasurable wisdom and limitless compassion that we call Amida Buddha. Amida is not a god/deity who confers prizes on some and punishment for others. We can’t curry favor through prayers, rituals, superstition, esoteric practice, or really any form of our own self-power because Amida is the truth of reality itself. When we awaken to this, and that we are “grasped, never to be abandoned” by wisdom and compassion, we act with a buoyant new spirit having become “soft and gentle in body and mind” according to Amida’s 33rd Vow.
I’m reminded of this when I think about a college friend who I’ll call Sophea (which means wisdom in Khmer). Sophea’s family were refugees from the Cambodian genocide, and she had roots in Cambodia Town, located in a largely underserved and disinvested part of Long Beach. Yet, she was a paragon of dana.
After much effort, she finally landed a job one summer at a tony law firm, which she sorely needed to pay tuition. Her professional attire was not as crisp and well-apportioned as is customary in a law firm, but she marched into that job on the first day with immense pride. Afterward she came back to campus armed with a tray of delectable fried chicken and a bag of freshly baked baguettes for all of her friends to enjoy. We feasted like kings! The pre-diabetic in me is now jealous of how we used to eat with reckless abandon, but even in that moment I was struck by the level of generosity she wanted to shower on us even though she hadn’t been paid yet!
Decades later, I reflect on how Sophea was one of my greatest teachers. From a Shinshu perspective, I’m left wondering if her kindness was not an expression of her own ego, but something greater. Growing up in onerous circumstances and inheriting a history unimaginable to most, had she been able to savor small expressions and moments that others would take for granted? Whether consciously or not, had she felt “grasped, never to be abandoned” by great compassion, which in turn called out to her to be a conduit of that compassion when she could? What in her karma allowed her to not be hardened by the weight of the past but, indeed, “soft and gentle in body and mind”?
The answers may never come to light, yet I am so grateful for the example that Sophea set!
NAMO AMIDA BUTSU
REV. JEAN-PAUL DEGUZMAN
A REFLECTION ON SELFLESS GIVING