Dr Diana Cousens here. Please download the Federation of Australian Buddhist Council’s statement on disability access to Buddhist temples. It is in seven languages, including Sinhalese.
http://www.buddhistcouncil.org.au/fed/home/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=108:disability-access&catid=41:buddhist-community&Itemid=86

Temples, like religions, are creations of the past, when ideas like gender equality, rights of the disabled people etc. had not even been heard of.

The future should be different.

Yapa,

I guess you are right. It’s not good to ridicule people. I will find solace in the fact that I nominated David for the presidency sometime back.

This also brings to mind the ridicule that was heaped on Hitler with the Schickelgruber moniker. When he came to power he ordered his ancestral village Dollersheim and documents about his Jewish ancestry to be razed.

When people brought up the issue of a “Jew” paying his grandmother some money, Hitler claimed that a trick was played on the gullible “Jew” to part with money by foisting the claim that the “Jew” had fathered his father. I am sure the local name changers here can also give such a twist.

Nevertheless, all such things that happened in Germany and Sri Lanka provide us with prima facie indications to warrant a psychoanalytic study to dvelve deeper to determine if there are any patterns. I think we all should submit ourselves willingly to such an inquiry. It’s time to bring in that emblem of psychoanalysis – the couch. It also makes me wonder why a couch was ordered by our plenipotentiary in Paris? Is he ahead of the game?

I guess I am on my way to becoming Jewish then.

Dear Keynes!/nathan;

David Blacker has been always honest about it and publicly said so though it is it is not mandatory to declare so and it is unnecessary to talk about these unnecessary things.

I don’t think it is a healthy habit to dig up and talk about personal matters of others.

However, nathan’s grievance/complain is not that justifiable in this case.

Thanks!

“David Blacker’s mother is Tamil. Does he call himself a Tamil Burgher?”

No one wants to be associated with losers.

Or, in other terms, there is a psychological tendency among individuals in all societies marked by hierarchies to associate themselves, as much as possible, with the politically and culturally dominant sections.

I fear however, that the author will loose a great deal of her audience because there is a big leap made from her experiences/observations, to how Buddhists in Sri Lanka worrship and take part in spiritual and religious life on a day-to-day basis. Most temples in Sri Lanka are actually full of “aged people, pregnant women and children”, especially in the evenings, weekends and poya days (not to mention that I have often been put to shame by the elderly on pilgrimages to sacred sites, where faith seems to give them supernatural endurance while I am huffing and sweaty). Most people (including soldiers) attend their local temples and reserve the sites mentioned for special trips (unless one lives in Kandy).

I am not convinced that any of the groups of people mentioned feel banished from participation in community life. I am not denying that this may be a problem, but perhaps the author can say more here about wider experiences or reports/studies from Sri Lanka?

I like the point she makes about being a Sinhala Burgher.

Every other Tom, Dick and Harriet in this country is busy becoming Sinhalese. Gomin Dias becomes Gomin Dayasiri, Tuwan Mohammad Dilshan becomes Tillakaratne Mudiyanselage Dilshan and Kandiah Balendran becomes Ken Balendra.

David Blacker’s mother is Tamil. Does he call himself a Tamil Burgher?

It is not the lack of wheelchairs or the policies of the temples that restricts persons with disabilities from visiting temples. It is ignorance that is the problem.

Very interesting.