Buddhist Monks Take Business Courses to Learn Temple Management

September 15, 2005

Source: The Times

http://www.timesonline.co.uk/article/0,,3-1780856,00.html

On September 15, 2005 The Times reported, "Zen and the art of business management have reached China: monks from the Jade Buddha Monastery in Shanghai are attending business school. The Antai School of Management accepted 18 of them this month for a new MBA course in temple management. 'We live in the metropolis of Shanghai and we need to find a way to interact between Buddhism and society. This requires a different management style,' Master Chang Chun, the general manager at the Jade Buddha temple, said in a luxurious boardroom in a state-of-the-art glass and marble building behind the place of worship. The century-old temple attracts a constant stream of visitors — more than a million pilgrims and about half a million tourists each year — and managing the revenues is a daunting job... Master Chang Chun (Eternal Spring) said that he hoped that the MBA course would enable the monastery to balance better the spiritual and material wealth of the temple."