By Gabriella Payne
There’s going to be a lot more room to learn at Berwick’s Buddhist Temple, the Sakyamuni Sambuddha Vihara very soon, as works near completion on the new Sinhalese language school, which is set to be one of the largest in the state.
Not only will the new expansive building be home to the Sinhalese language school, but a brand new meditation centre for the wider community to enjoy.
Sinhalese is the language primarily spoken by the Buddhist peoples of Sri Lanka, and with a large Sri Lankan community in the area, the temple’s committee said that they were looking forward to opening the new centre very soon as demand for classes was very high.
On Tuesday 20 April, Federal La Trobe MP Jason Wood went on a tour of the new facilities with the chief incumbent (monk) of the Buddhist Vihara, Ven Digamadulle Wimalananda Thero, the president of the temple’s committee, Mr Ilansaratne and another committee member, Yamuna Medawalage.
Mr Wood said that it was fantastic to see the federal government’s grant of $780,000 being put to good use and to see the progress that had been made so far on the centre.
“It’s so important to keep second languages going,” Mr Wood said.
“They [the temple committee] had a vision, and this will be a very important space for the Sri Lankan community.
But it’s not just for the Sinhalese speaking community – everyone and anyone is welcome.
It will be an important space for meditation for all people – it’s just so important to keep level headed,” he said.
Mr Ilansaratne said that the Sakyamuni Sambuddha Vihara were very grateful to Mr Wood and the federal government for investing in their new centre, which they will use for many Sunday school classes in the near future.
“We are very fortunate to have these new facilities,” he said.
“We have a great deal of space now and a very nice building.”
Mr Ilansaratne said that with about 500 students and just a few classrooms before, there was little room to move, but now there will be plenty of room for the whole community.
The centre will “hopefully be finished by the end of May” according to Mr Ilansaratne and they couldn’t wait to see the end result – especially since the build had been delayed due to Covid.
Mr Wood added that he hoped to see more facilities like this popping up throughout the La Trobe electorate.
“Hopefully this will be the first of one of many language centres in the area,” he said.
