Although the Titanic was called the ‘unsinkable’ luxury liner, it sank on its first voyage caused by a collision with an iceberg. Those of you who watched this movie can recall that all the passengers enjoyed their voyage with dainty dishes, alcoholic drinks, dance, love, gambling, and so forth. Some of them danced, while others gambled every night with fun and amusement. Their enjoyments suddenly ended.

Some got upset for parting from their beloved forever. Some fell into the dark and cold ocean with fright, and some prayed with lamentation, and so forth.

Seeing that scene, I thought that this was not a story of other people, but the way we live our lives today. It means that when we have money, we think that money is the same as an unsinkable ship and we feel pleasant riding on that unsinkable ‘money’ boat. There are some people who ride on unsinkable ‘health’ boat. Some people ride on unsinkable ‘fame’, ‘love’ boat, and so forth. We think those unsinkable ‘money’, ‘love’, or other kinds of boats will never sink. In other words, we believe that as long as we have those, we can enjoy our voyage of life forever.

No matter how much we rely upon those ‘unsinkable’ boats, we actually sink sooner or later just like the Titanic. More importantly, an unsinkable boat of ‘myself’ will surely sink someday. Also, when the unsinkable boat sinks, your family, money, love, all those you dependent on so much, will not help at all. However, we always depend on such things. This is the truth and reality of our human life.

There are some people who will never trust human once he was betrayed by others. But we never give up money, health, and so forth, no matter how many times they betray us. When we get sick, there is no one who gives us his own physical body for us. There must be someone who had suffered from bankruptcy, but none of them ever totally renounce money. Fame, social status, love, health, and so forth are sinkable boats. More than that, we will be betrayed by them sometimes. But still we do not like to stay away from them and still tries to get more.

Why do we tend to seek those things that are ‘sinkable’ although they are actually unreliable? We do so because we do not know what is really unsinkable and reliable and yet we are uneasy and anxious without them. However, Shinran Shonin taught us what is the unsinkable and reliable.

    "The Ocean of birth-and-death, of painful existence, has no bound;

(The Collected Works of Shinran, Vol. I, Page363)

Amida Buddha’s Vow is to save all beings at all times and in all places without any discriminations. It is an unsinkable and reliable vessel on the stormy ocean of life. Amida Buddha always calls you to get on that boat with His voiceless voice. This is Shinran Shonin’s way of saying that Amida’s limitless and timeless Love and Compassion for us bears us all through the difficult ocean tides of life which are full of sufferings. This is why we always express our gratitude that we, ordinary people, who are happened to be born as human beings, can across the ocean which full of sufferings to the True World. Let us listen and recite the Nembutsu with a grateful heart for being sustained constantly in our daily life.

 Namo-Amidabutsu