East: Be Bold, Choose Peace!

September is the 50th anniversary of Second Soka Gakkai President Josei Toda’s declaration calling for the abolition of nuclear weapons. It is also the 50th Anniversary of the Student Division.

In November 2006, the Student Division Leaders in New York began speaking about the importance of 2nd Soka Gakkai President Toda’s declaration and wanted to create something dynamic to respond to Sensei’s expectations. It was at that time the Student Division leaders began brainstorming about creating a festival where we can gather thousands of youth to spread our movement for peace.

Because of the great significance, the New York Zone Youth Division extended this activity from Student Division to all Youth Division. With the students as the driving force and the full support of the men’s and women’s divisions, we are happy to report that the New York Zone Youth will hold a festival on Sept. 16 at Brooklyn's Prospect Park.

The purpose of having this peace festival is for each person who attends the festival to see that starting with themselves they can create a peaceful society and most importantly to reply to President Ikeda’s expectations of the youth. This is a great chance for us to show the power of youth and the commitment to peace and to respond to our mentor President Ikeda. This is a true preparation to welcome President Ikeda and Mrs. Ikeda back to America!

Our festival is on Sept. 16, but our true campaign begins before and ends after that day. Leading up to the festival all the members of the youth division are engages in a “Peace Dialogue Campaign.” As members of the youth division in New York Zone, it is our mission to spread peace through dialogue and sharing this Buddhism with others.

This campaign will serve as our first step toward actualizing this and serve as encouragement so that each member can realize his/her mission as a Bodhisattva of the Earth for worldwide kosen-rufu. Our target is to have 10,000 dialogues about peace based on Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism.

It’s all about sharing this Buddhism with others. Each youth division member is challenging to have dialogue with at least 10 people by Sept. 16. After each dialogue we will give the person a button with our Festival Theme “Be Bold Choose Peace,” and information about SGI-USA. The following week after the festival will be the district discussion meeting week, and throughout the East Territory the discussion topic will be based on peace and President Toda’s Declaration. With four-divisional unity, New York Zone Youth will create great momentum of shakubuku in September.

Activities in the SGI are created for all members to do their human revolution and win in their personal lives. Through this campaign, the youth of the New York Zone are determined to set great examples of personal victory. We are very confident that we are creating the golden history. Every single youth member is challenging themselves in this dialogue campaign. No one can’t stop our joy to share Nichiren Daishonin’s Buddhism to people around us!

Please watch out for New York Zone Youth!!

East Territory- New York Zone Youth Leaders
Kazuyo and Josh