FreezeFest: Spiritual Symbols, Food, and Culture from Around the World

Connect with the Nichiren Community Group alongside Spirituality and Religious Life, the Interfaith Council, and the Global Union at FreezeFest this Wednesday, February 5th! Join us as we come together with RIT’s spiritual and religious leaders to share the rich meaning behind our sacred symbols, traditional foods, and cultural practices. This is a wonderful opportunity to learn, engage, and celebrate the diversity of faith and spirituality in our community.

The Nichiren Community Group will be exhibiting a variety of Iconography, service bells, percussion instruments for timekeeping, and forms of the Lotus Sutra.

Stop by our table to get your heavenly fortune!

Omikuji, known as a "heavenly lottery," are fortune slips traditionally found at Shinto shrines and Buddhist temples. To get one, individuals shake an Omikuji box until a numbered stick emerges from a small opening. This number corresponds to a slip of paper that reveals their fortune, which can range from great blessings to misfortune. In addition to predicting luck, Omikuji provide guidance on various aspects of life, including love, health, and career. A favorable fortune is typically kept as a token of good luck, while an unfavorable one is often tied to a designated area—such as a shrine rack or, in this case, our table to dispel misfortune.

Omikuji reflect the shifting nature of fortune, and the unpredictability of life, and serve as a reminder to strive for a meaningful and virtuous path.

Services Online

We will continue holding our evening services online every Monday from 6:30 to 7:30 pm EST. Whether you’re a current student, a graduate, a community member, or part of the global Nichiren Sangha, you’re always welcome to join us!

Monday, February 3rd
- The Eight Phases of the Buddha’s Life, #8: Entering Nirvana
Monday, February 10th
- Ancestors Service, Sagaki Hoyo (Hungary Ghost Service)
Monday, February 17th
-  Sutra Study: Lotus Sutra, chapter 1, Introduction
Monday, February 24th
- Sutra Study: Lotus Sutra, chapter 2, Expedients
 

From the Lotus Sutra

Finding ourselves in sacred places that may seem to be mundane, from the Lotus Sutra, chapter 21, The Supernatural Powers of the Tathagatas.

In any world where anyone keeps, reads, recites, expounds, or copies this sutra, or acts according to the teachings, or in any place where a copy of the sutra is put, be it in a garden, in a forest, under a tree, in a monastery, in the house of a person in white robes, in a hall, in a mountain, in a valley, or in the wilderness, there should a stupa be erected and offerings be made to it because, know this, the place where the stupa is erected is the place of enlightenment.
The Lotus Sutra, Murano, third edition, p.300
 

Gassho,
Rev. Ryumon Chad Grohman
Chaplain, RIT Nichiren Community Group