Living Buddha must deal with issues that go beyond religion

Angwen Danbarenqing, the 29-year-old abbot of Jiegu Monastery and a living Buddha, has been busy this week in Jiegu town.

He's been shuttling between meetings with designers for the reconstruction of the monastery, local residents wanting to discuss matters of land use, and his monks to make arrangements for memorial services one year after the earthquake that rocked the area last year on April 14.

'In the past year, we have held many salvation ceremonies for families of the quake victims,' said the man known as Danba to his fellow monks. 'We have also helped out in the reconstruction process whenever we were needed.'

More than 90 per cent of Yushu's population are Tibetan Buddhists and they often go to monks for problems beyond religion. For example, some residents were worried about their lands being confiscated without compensation for road construction, and they sought advice from Danba, who then sometimes felt the need to approach the builders to make sure proper procedures were being followed.

'After all, the people are religious, and we can help facilitate communication,' he said.

The use of Tibetan Buddhism in post-quake Yushu is also apparent in the psychological consultation work carried out by Heilongjiang native Meng Fanlong and his teammate, Malaysian volunteer Dr Rachel Ting Sing Kiat, both of whom also worked in Wenchuan , Sichuan , after the 2008 quake.

'One time we tried to console a very poor mother who lost her daughter, but we weren't very successful. In the end we gave her some money to buy a yak-oil lamp so she could burn the lamp for her daughter, and she was much relieved after that,' Ting said. 'It has proved much more effective when we merge elements of religion into our consultation work.'