Vietnamese Buddhist Sangha to mark 40th anniversary in virtual ceremony

A virtual ceremony is scheduled to take place on November 7 to mark the 40th founding anniversary of the Vietnamese Buddhist Sangha (VBS) as the COVID-19 situation remains complicated.

An event to mark Buddha's birthday in Hue (Photo: Cong Hau)
An event to mark Buddha's birthday in Hue (Photo: Cong Hau)

The ceremony will be held in Hanoi and livestreamed to provinces and cities throughout the country.

The event will affirm that the VBS is the successor of thousands of years of Vietnamese Buddhism and that its foundation was to meet Vietnamese Buddhists’ wish to unify different schools and traditions.

The anniversary is also an occasion for the sangha to review its achievements over the past four decades.

From November 4-11, representatives of nine Buddhist traditions in Vietnam held a convention at the Quan Su Temple in Hanoi and agreed to establish the Vietnamese Buddhist Sangha.

The VBS currently has nearly 55,000 monks and nuns, 18,000 places of worship and 50 million adherents and supporters.

Over the past 40 years, the VBS has made significant contributions to building a Vietnamese culture imbued with national tradition by upholding national solidarity, safeguarding fine cultural values and rejecting superstition.