Andy Evans shares on standing true in cultural diversity

Andy Evans

In a calendar of Japanese traditional festivals, O-bon is a big one. The way to the land of the dead is opened, and the spirits of the ancestors can emerge for a few days. Family members guide them back from their grave to their former home, where a spirit house is prepared for them. A priest will come and recite a sutra. Family members kneel and pray to the ancestors, and offer them food. Often whole communities will come together for a time of celebration and dancing.

In Japanese society harmony is highly valued, and compromise is a virtue. People are expected to "keep the water still" as a Japanese saying goes. Don't stand out, don't make waves. Go with the flow. It is assumed that individuals will join in with group activities. Our family know that we are Christians, but the cultural expectation was that we would compromise, accept the Buddhist heritage of the family and join in the ceremony. They didn't mind if we believed in the statue on the altar or not. For many Japanese what you do can be totally separate from what you believe. The important part is that it looks right; that you show respect.

O-bon is part of fulfilling the obligations to our ancestors. According to a Japanese Buddhist text called the Urabon Sutra, this obligation is as "Boundless as the heavens." A good Japanese could spend their lives trying to fulfil this obligation, praying and maintaining the grave, guiding them back home during O-bon for years and never, ever really fulfil their obligations. When they die, the next generation has the same obligation to them, and so on.

My wife and I decided that we were not going to take part in O-bon. We love and respect our Japanese family, but we want our children to live in freedom, & not under obligation. So we made a time when we could talk with my in-laws and told them that we would not be taking any part in the festival.

Remember, we were supposed to keep the water still. This was dropping a big rock in the mill pool. Family members who attended church found it hard to understand. They had compromised, that was the way Japan worked. Couldn't we do the same? Why were we rejecting the Buddhist traditions?

The waves spread through the family. Sometimes we wondered if we were just annoying people. When another family member came to visit we were quite apprehensive. We knew they must have heard what had happened. Would they also feel rejected by us? We had enjoyed their friendship before and we were a bit apprehensive in case we had lost it.

The festival came up in the conversation very soon. But it was not what we had expected. They told us how they had always felt they had to participate, even though they did not want to, how they had struggled with the pressure and the conformity; and generally avoided it for years, telling their parents that it was impossible to come home. "I tell the family that I'm busy at University", they admitted: "But I just don't like it. It's good that you are making a stand."

That is the trouble with "compromise" isn't it? It sounds a good "Christian" attitude, but what it is really doing is denying people a choice, possibly a chance for freedom.

Jesus didn't compromise when it came to rules that were more important than people. He brought freedom, and you can't bring freedom through compromising all the time and being liked. He knew that what he had was much greater and he wasn't afraid to make a few waves.

So that is sometimes hard. It goes against the culture we are in and the current trend of all faiths being equal. Fair enough. On the other hand it gives people a choice. When a wave comes they can ignore it, reject it, and wait for the water to calm down as before.

Or they can ride it.

Copyright Andy Evans 2006