Ladies and Gentlemen, and Friends;

I am Daijiro Ai, and I am principal of Itto-en School which is the smallest private school in Japan. There are only 5 to 10 pupils ( or students) in each grade from the primary school to the junior and senior high schools, and there are less than 100 students in total. Itto-School was founded by Tenko Nishida in 1933, about 70 years ago.

Although Tenko san was born in a family of an old paper merchant in Shiga prefecture in 1872, he had a unique personality to think always about the way of Life of human beings. After various experience in trouble, he found his own way of life the moment he listened to a baby's crying in a morning after fasting for three days. He made up his mind to follow the law of nature, completely giving himself in trust to God (the Light), like a baby trusts and depends on its mother.

After that, he worked to help people without any remuneration and wherever he went he was given what he needed to live like a baby. His way of life attracted spiritual people and gathered them around him and gradually religious living community was formed at Yamashina, eastern part of Kyoto in 1928. It was called Itto-en, (Garden of One Light).
Even now, after the founder's death in 1968 (when 96 years old), Ittoen members work in the spirit of repentance, thanksgiving and service, living as one big family.

Now in Itto-en, there are printing and publishing company, agricultural institute, architectural company and a traveling drama group named SWARAJ. SWARAJ means perfection or self government in Hlndi language, and it is famous as Mahatme Gandhi's Movement for Indian Independence.

The Founder, Tenko san named the drama group SWARAJ after Gandhi's thoughts. When he was sometimes asked to lecture in foreign countries, the mass media there introduced unique school, kindergarten and primary, junior and senior high schools in Itto-en. Although the title of the speech given to me this time is '' Religious Education for Children'', my speech today may be not a usual speech on that topic, but a series of minor thoughts on Itto-en's life, which is unique in Japan, and how that life is practiced at our school.

In Japan, the ''Fundamental Law of Education'' prohibits the teachers of public schools from providing any religious education. Recently, however, some Japanese have begun to demand revision of this law. Of course, we, private school teachers, can freely teach any particular religion to the students.

I think, we, all human beings, are given a spiritual power ( or a spiritual feeling) at our birth in a divine providence by the Great Nature. If you take a two- or three- year old baby to a deep forest, you will notice that its heart beats more rapidly. This means all human beings are able to feel the spiritual wave sent from the Universe, which transcends all human knowledge ( or human power). Some scientists report that the brain wave of babies at birth is 7.8hertz, while the wave of the nature is also 7.8 hertz.
In addition, this 7.8 hertz wave gives people comfortable feeling, and produces the hormone called Alpha Wave from their brain. Then, no one feels uncomfortable to be with a baby or in the Nature. I think we, adults, should have children notice the Mystery or Preciousness of Life and Death.

We, human beings, are destined to die in one of the following seven ways:

They are: Natural Death
Death by Disease
Death by Accident
Suicide
Murder
Death in War
Starvation

I often ask this question about death to the audience during my lecture in Japan, but they can guess only five items of them except the last two, Death in War and Starvation.
I know the reason why they cannot guess all of them. We, Japanese have neither War nor Hunger in our country, and perhaps the people of other developed countries have same situation, I think. But, actually, more than one third of people's deaths on the earth are caused by War and Hunger, I understand.

In Japan, it is reported that there are more than thirty thousand suicides in a year. This means ninety people kill themselves every day. I do not know how many suicides take place in other countries, but the suicide rate in Japan in proportion to its population must be higher than in most other countries, even though there are no Deaths in War and Starvation in Japan.

Our Itto-en School has three points of the educational policy: studying, sweating and prayer.

The first point, studying, is to learn academic knowledge and skills of course, and they are very important in our school, too. However, I think we, human beings, should have other important things in order to live, besides academic knowledge and skills. But, almost all of the schools in Japan are teaching only academic knowledge and skills in their curriculums.

In Ittoen, our school puts an important emphasis on sweating and prayer in addition to studying knowledge and skills as the educational policy of our school. The second point, sweating means to work for peoples and society not in a classroom but outside: fro example, by taking care of old people, cooking at the community dinning hall, cleaning gardens or streets, even toilets sometimes, and so on. It may usually be called service or volunteering, but we call it '' SAMU' a term of Zen Buddhism, and it is put in the curriculum as one of the most important part of education in Ittoen School.

The third point, prayer, is not one about a particular religion's doctrine or denomination.
It is prayer for thanks, for reflection, and for oath (vow) as human beings. In Ittoen School, our children have a meditation service with their teachers at the worship hall for a quarter of an hour every morning. That may not be much time, but every day's meditation must give deep concentration to their brain. I think we, human beings, not only children but also adults, need to have this kind of calm time once a day.

During the meditation in a silent space without any sound, the children think, What am I, What is Life, What is Human Being, What is Nature, and the Universe, Season, Family and so on.

They are seeking themselves.
He is seeking himself.
She is seeking herself.
We, Human beings, are seeking ourselves.

We may not be able to get the answer to all of these questions. However, even if we cannot, we, human beings, are destined to continue to seek these answers during our life. And this seeking way of life promotes religious spirit in the human beings, I think.
During the meditation, we can feel the Greatness of the Nature and Preciousness of Life and Death.

Our Ittoen School children have a lot of animals, fishes, insects and birds in the classrooms and the schoolyards. Once, they had a dog named DON (it's from donkey) which they found in the mountain. They loved him, taking a walk, playing on the school ground, running around in the mountain every day. When he died of old age, they buried him under a wooden monument written with the name '' DON'' in a corner of the garden, and performed a funeral with all school members.

After that, many more wooden monuments written with the names of animals, insects, fishes and birds were built round the school garden. I think it show that our children know the Mystery of Preciousness of Life and Death.

Finally, I would like to mention that we, human beings, have seven crises that threaten our total destruction on the earth.

These seven crises are:

(1) Natural Disaster ( drought, calamity, catastrophe, etc.)
(2) Environment Destruction ( global warming, acid rain, etc.)
(3) Warfare ( Nuclear war, Terrorism, Germ and Chemical war, etc.)
(4) Incurable and Fatal Diseases ( HIV and infectious diseases, etc)
(5) Food Crisis due to Population Explosion
(6) Exhaustion ( Depletion )of Natural Resources
(7) Wilderness ( or Desolation ) in the hearts of the People

Although these crises are very difficult problems to solve for the people, they are all the results from people's way of thinking and lifestyles, except the Natural Disaster. Especially, I think the last item, Wilderness in the Hearts of the People'' is the fundamental issue to the people who engage in religion and education. I think, we, adults, should patiently convey the importance of the spiritual way of life and death to our children in our daily life.

Now I would like to close my talk with this thought, we human beings have one more style of death in addition to the seven styles of death I spoke of earlier. We may call it ''Death founded upon spiritual Readiness''. That is, we seriously live with preparedness for death in our daily life.

Thank you very much for your kind and calm attention.