Japanese Buddhist Bon Dances in Hawai'i

August 10, 2002

Source: The New York Times

On August 10, 2002 The New York Times featured an article on Buddhism in Hawai'i and the state's famous Bon dances. "Bon dances are Buddhist religious events in which participants dance to rejoice in the annual return visit of departed loved ones... Bon dances arrived here with Japanese sugar workers in the 19th century. But in recent decades, the celebrations have crossed ethnic and religious lines to become an elaborate church fair... All summer long, families of Philippine, Caucasian, Hawaiian, Chinese and multiethnic ancestry arrive with lawn chairs at the dozens of bon dances across the state... Some scholars and ministers said that... the popularity of the bon dance masked a troubling decline in membership... Hawaii had an estimated 100,000 Buddhists in 1999... [and] is one of nine states with 50 or more Buddhist centers, said Grove Harris, project manager at the Pluralism Project at Harvard...    But Honpa Hongwanji Hawaii Betsuin in Honolulu... the largest temple... has lost nearly half its membership, falling to 1,300 families from 2,500 in 1990, the Rev. Reynold Fujikawa said... Young people are not succeeding elderly members who die, scholars said, at least partly because they do not need the cultural comfort that the temple provided their immigrant predecessors. Japanese Buddhists are also losing adherents to intermarriage, the scholars said, which in Hawaii accounts for more than 50 percent of all unions."