{"id":71040,"date":"2017-10-25T16:21:30","date_gmt":"2017-10-25T23:21:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=71040"},"modified":"2017-10-25T16:21:30","modified_gmt":"2017-10-25T23:21:30","slug":"the-maha-sangha-remains-the-nations-savior","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2017\/10\/25\/the-maha-sangha-remains-the-nations-savior\/","title":{"rendered":"The Maha Sangha remains the nation\u2019s savior"},"content":{"rendered":"

P. S. MAHAWATTE Colombo 5\u00a0Courtesy The Island<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

October 26, 2017, 12:58 pm<\/span>
\nThe Most Ven. Maha Nayaka Theras, Kotugoda Dhammavasa, Ittapane Dhammalankara, Thirukunamale Ananda and Prof. Bellanwila Wimalaratne, having gone through the Report of the Steering Committee of the Constitutional Assembly with fine tooth comb, has warned of the dangers of this Report as “it seems that not only the alteration of the meanings of the constitution is fraudulent, it is also an attempt to mislead the Sinhala masses.”<\/p>\n

“Among the proposals put forward is the proposal to amalgamate the northern and eastern provinces with the objective of legalizing the false and fraudulent demand for a historical Tamil homeland pursued by Tamil separatists”.<\/p>\n

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“We are constrained to point out that the advice given by the Maha Sangha on various occasions not to engage in such a distorted constitutional process has been ignored”.<\/p>\n

These are only a few excerpts from the long Report of the Maha Sangha published in the Daily Mirror of 30th Sept.<\/p>\n

Rev.Fr. Vimal Tirimanna, CSsR, in an analytical article in The Island of 11th October, 17 captioned “Yahapalanaya govt. has neither valid mandate nor credibility to draft a new constitution” concludes “The only way the government can have both a mandate and the necessary credibility to draft a new constitution is to call a general election and muster a clear-cut majority rather than hoodwinking the people with their fairy tale arguments, for postponing all elections. A new Constitution should not be a fa\u00e7ade to achieve the egoistic agendas of its drafters irrespective of what the citizens really desire at this moment through such a Constitution”.<\/p>\n

In The Island of 12th July, Mr.H.L.D. Mahindapala replying to Prof. L. Fernando\u2019s letter “Sangha State behind the State” wrote “It is the Sangha that laid the foundation for this nation”.<\/p>\n

In an article by NAN in The Sunday Island wrote “Buddhist Temples were ravaged, Sacred Books burnt and those of the Sangha whether Monks or nuns put to death, if they did not renounce their religion. This caused the demise of Nuns. Monks lived hiding in jungles or in disguise. Leadership of brave monks restored religion”.<\/p>\n

It is a historical fact that all the invaders of our country committed so much atrocities to get rid of Buddhism, and if not for our Maha Sangha they may have even succeeded by resorting to the conversion of the Buddhists by all sorts of inducements to which only a few succumbed.<\/p>\n

Seventy four percent of this country\u2019s populace is Sinhalese and over 70 percent of them are Buddhists. And not the Tamils, not the Muslims, not the Hindus, not the Catholics, not the Christians ever asked for any change to Article 9 of the constitution. All knew that whatever decree on paper, Buddhism was deeply and indelibly written, etched in flesh and blood and transfused in every sinew, vein and artery of the majority\u2019s Buddhist heart.<\/p>\n

For what possible reason should any Sinhala Buddhist dominated government do that unless they had a death wish? Especially when no other religious leaders have ever called for it?<\/p>\n

“Malcolm Cardinal Ranjith, Archbishop of Colombo and Head of the Roman Catholic Church in Lanka, was even moved to publicly declare his opposition to any constitutional dilution of the foremost place granted to Buddhism in Article 9” says Don Manu captioned “Will Lanka\u2019s constitutional scapegoat face sacrificial slaughter on the people\u2019s alter?” in the Sunday Times of October 15th.<\/p>\n

This yahapalana government cannot bring about any reconciliation by juggling with words in Article 9 of the Constitution, which clearly states “The Republic of Sri Lanka shall give to Buddhism the foremost place and accordingly, it shall be the duty of the State to protect and foster the Buddha Sasana, while assuring to all religions the rights granted by Articles 10 and 14(1) (e)”.<\/p>\n

P. S. MAHAWATTE<\/p>\n

Colombo 5<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

P. S. MAHAWATTE Colombo 5\u00a0Courtesy The Island October 26, 2017, 12:58 pm The Most Ven. Maha Nayaka Theras, Kotugoda Dhammavasa, Ittapane Dhammalankara, Thirukunamale Ananda and Prof. Bellanwila Wimalaratne, having gone through the Report of the Steering Committee of the Constitutional Assembly with fine tooth comb, has warned of the dangers of this Report as “it […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-71040","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71040","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=71040"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/71040\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=71040"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=71040"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=71040"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}