It's Hungry Ghost Festival today and there's a prayer at home specially to the ancestors. Hungry Ghost Festival is a Chinese festival but Buddhists would easily embrace it. In fact, the festival was said to be inspired by the Buddhist text Ullambana Sutra. A disciple of Buddha, Maudgalyayana, upon attaining abhijna, learned that his mother was now a hungry ghost in hell. Maudgalyayana was distraught when the rice he offered his mother turned into burning hot coals. The Buddha said it would take the combined spiritual power of the Sangha for her liberation. Maudgalyayana was then asked to prepare an offering of food, fruits, incense, oil, lamps, candles, beds and bedding on the 15th day of the seventh month for the Sangha who would recite mantras on his behalf. Not sure if the food were for the deceased or Sangha.
30.8.23
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