Julian Leeser (Berowra, Liberal Party, Shadow Minister for Indigenous Australians) Share this | Hansard source

This motion from the member for Barton provides all members with an opportunity to reflect on the cultural and religious diversity of their electorate, and I thank her for putting it forward. In the electorate of Berowra, we have a very strong group of religious communities of a range of different faiths. Sixty-five per cent of people that live in my electorate are adherents to some form of faith tradition, with 47 per cent being Christian, 6½ per cent being Hindu, 3.2 per cent being Buddhist, slightly under two per cent being Muslim and under one per cent being Sikhs, Jews, Baha'i and Zoroastrians. So we have quite a degree of religious diversity in our community.

One of the communities with whom I have had lots to do over my service as the member for Berowra is the Mahamevnawa Buddhist monastery at Cattai. On Sunday I had the privilege of being there to help lay the foundation stones for their new stupa. The monastery is quite amazing, and I've seen its development over the decade that I've been the member for Berowra, starting out with purely the prayer hall, then the dining hall, then the dedication of a Buddha statue, then the Bodhi tree relocation, where the pagoda is now under construction, and now the stupa. I want to acknowledge my good friend Reverend Soma Thero, who I regard as 'Aussie Soma' because he took his Australian citizenship a short time ago, which was a moment of great delight for me personally. He is the key spiritual leader of the Mahamevnawa Buddhist monastery. At the dedication of the stupa was his colleague Reverend Kekirawe Bodhidhamma Thero from Melbourne, who is the head of the monastery in Melbourne. We even had a visiting monk from Sri Lanka, Sumedha Thero, who was previously the founding monk who founded the Mahamevnawa monastery at Cattai.

I want to particularly acknowledge the amazing community that has really developed around the monastery and has seen this grow over many years—in particular, Rasika De Silva, who is the trustee of the monastery and is often the guiding force in terms of organising people in the community. What's so amazing about the community is that within the community there are architects, structural engineers, construction services, surveyors and stormwater consultants—all people who've volunteered their time to build this particular monastery at Cattai.

I want to mention some of their names, and I apologise if my pronunciation of the Sinhalese names is not as good as it should be. I want to acknowledge Sasanarathi Thero, who is the assistant chief monk. I want to acknowledge the architect, Kamalanie Gunatilake. I want to acknowledge the structural engineer, Damith Mohotti. I want to acknowledge the managing director of Intermarc Global, Dhammika Gunaratne. I want to acknowledge Mr Thevakumar, who's in charge of the construction services; Mr Siva Balamayuran; Mr Sunil Liyanage, the surveyor; engineer Ranji Premaratne; and project coordinator Dileepa Rathnayake.

It's been a really amazing thing to see the stupa develop. A stupa is often the spiritual heart of the monastery, and it's positioned prominently and approached with great reverence. Visiting and honouring a stupa encourages reflection on Buddha's virtues, on strengthening of right views and on commitment to living according to the dharma. The stupa is primarily a place of veneration and merit making and reminds devotees of the Buddha's enlightenment, his teachings of the Noble Eightfold Path and the goal of nirvana. The stupa inspires laypeople to practice generosity, morality and mental cultivation in daily life. The history of the stupa goes back more than 2½ thousand years, after the passing away of the Buddha, an event known as the Parinirvana of the Buddha. His followers wanted a way to honour and remember him, and, according to Buddhist traditions, Buddhist relics such as ashes and sacred remains were divided and placed inside stupas built in different regions. These stupas became important places where Buddhists could pay respect to the Buddha and reflect on his teachings.

I want to particularly acknowledge the Mahamevnawa community and say how delighted I was to see the construction of the stupa and its foundation stones being laid. We hope that by the end of the year the stupa will be up and running and will make a great contribution to this wonderful site, one of the most serene places in my community. One of the things that I particularly enjoy about visiting the Mahamevnawa monastery is when they pray the loving-kindness meditation: 'May all the people in the world be free of ill will, free of jealousy.' I sometimes think that they're sentiments we could benefit from in the parliament! I know the monks know that I particularly love the loving-kindness meditation.

To everyone at the Mahamevnawa monastery at Cattai: congratulations. I look forward to further developments at your site.

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