Paper short abstract:

The paper explores the concept of ご縁 as a lens into understanding how Buddhist temple priests view and face the realities of survival and community erosion in relation to their religious and social situation, in the context of "Japan's shrinking regions" (Matanle 2011).

Paper long abstract:

The paper explores the concept of ご縁 as a lens into understanding how Buddhist temple priests view and face the realities of survival and community erosion in relation to their religious and social situation, in the context of "Japan's shrinking regions" (Matanle 2011). In recent years, research into regional decline in Japan has focused on issues of depopulation and its economic consequences and changes in social and family structures, that provide the background for this paper's analysis of rural problems through a prism of Buddhist temples. Researchers have long been aware of the demographic and regional decline challenges facing traditional Buddhist temples (Ishii 1996, Covell 2005; Rowe 2007, Reader 2011); however, ethnographic explorations of local narratives and connections are an infrequently treated topic in scholarly debates. Such a perspective can offer a window into local experiences of Buddhism 'on the ground' by showing how different actors develop their individual and collective understandings of Buddhism as a living entity in their communities.

This paper expands the discussion on the current state of Japanese Buddhism by presenting a case study of a Jodo Shinshu bodaiji temple located in Hiroshima Prefecture. Based on 12 months of ethnographic fieldwork of living at the temple, and data collected there, it examines the currents of change influencing notions of belonging and socio-economic existence within the temple and its broader communal, regional, and organisational frameworks. Through an analysis of qualitative and quantitative data, I aim to explore the local networks of sustainability and trust between a temple and its community. The notions of trust, dependency, responsibility, duty and gratitude embedded in the concept of goen (a term used repeatedly by those - from priests to parishioners - associated with the temple to describe their connections with the temple and community) will be evaluated as both a Buddhist and a social narrative of cause and effect, which generate connections among the living and the dead. Finally, stemming from the ethnographic method, this paper aims to contextualise the meaning of the macro narratives of Buddhism's future survival within the intricacies of the micro data economics of this case study.