Englishwoman Takes Buddhist Nun’s Vows

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29728, 23 January 1962, Page 2

Englishwoman Takes Buddhist Nun’s Vows

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright)

MALACCA (South Malaya), January 21 A 38-year-old English music teacher from Sussex today donned saffron robes and took the solemn vows of celibacy, chastity and poverty to become a nun in the Buddhist order.

Miss Peggy Kennet, now known as Sister Sumitra ("Good Friend”) went through the hour - long ceremony in humble reverence as 30 Buddhist monks and nuns chanted prayers and made symbolic offerings to the rhythmic beat of drums and gongs. Stripped of all luxuries of the world and with her head shaved as a mark of humility, Sister Sumitra knelt bare-footed in front of the altar and placed three sandalwood sticks on a ceremonial vase of sacred fire as her simple offering to the Lord Buddha, the Enlightened One. By this act she dedicated herself to the “service of Buddha and to the service of the order of monks and nuns.” Miss Kennet is the first Englishwoman to be ordained a Buddhist nun in Malaya More than 1000 people— Europeans, Chinese. Indians, and Malayans—crowded the main worshipping hall of the ancient Seek Kiah Een temple where the ordination ceremony was performed Red candles and paper lanterns painted with Chinese dragons illuminated the altar where a large statue of the Buddha sat serenely under a colourful pagoda The smell of burning incense and ancient music from Chinese flutes filled the hall as the Englishwoman went through the strict rituals, conducted in Chinese and English, in silent meditation,' clasping her prayer beads

The Rev. Sumangalo, a 59-year-old American monk who is Chief Abbot of North Malaya. performed the ordination ceremony. Miss Kennet will from now

on eat only simple vegetarian dishes and will avoid all worldly pleasures. After the ceremony Sister Sumitra said that the Rev. Sumangalo was the "driving force” in her decision to enter the Buddhist order of nuns.

A bachelor of music from Durham University, and born into a Christian family, she said she entered the Buddhist Society in England at the age of 16 and had hoped to become a nun ever since. “My ordination today is the happiest event in all my life,” she said.