Click-a-Sermon 13:   "Quest for the Unknown"  

Last week, the accidental death of the seven astronauts aboard the space shuttle Columbia shocked the entire world. Those seven who died symbolized man's challenge of the frontiers of tomorrow and their passing makes us pause to consider the nature of man and his future.

No one can deny the political and military implications of all national space programs, yet their human significance is even more important. For those seven astronauts represented man's driving determination to seek a new frontier and challenge the unknown. Their contributions to humanity were equivalent to Bodhisattva practice indeed.

Today, outer space is the last frontier in man's search to find himself and his origin. His quest for the unknown is in reality, an effort to find himself.

Buddhism shares the desire to expand new frontiers, but it also seeks to explore our internal frontiers. And the Buddhist quest for the unknown is to discover the Ultimate Reality called Enlightenment.

Common man dwells in a world of discrimination with preconceived notions and accepting illusions as real, he is unable to perceive true reality. This mortal failing is the major cause of human suffering and pain. If we can touch or feel the impact of reality-as-it-is, we will awaken to the understanding of Ultimate Reality, the greatest Unknown.

Despite all risks and costs, man should forever accept the challenge to explore the frontiers of outer space --- for to forgo such would be an admission of our failure as human beings. But at the same time, Buddhists believe that we must not neglect to seek the frontiers of human existence --- the quest for the Ultimate Reality, the Ultimate Unknown that must be discovered within as well as without.

© Reno Buddhist Church, 2003