Yesterday I did the weekly grocery shopping. The supermarket featured foods for Easter and Passover dinners, and the store was brightly decorated with pictures of Easter bunnies and what may have been cartoon matzoh balls, although it was hard to tell.
The young woman running the cash register wished me a happy holiday. In fact, Sunday is Hanamatsuri, the celebration of Buddha's birthday in Japan. I imagined adding pictures of the pointing baby Buddha to those of the egg-bearing rabbits and unleavened bread balls. Well, maybe not.
I don't expect to live long enough to see Buddhism accepted as a "normal" American religious tradition, and not something exotic and alien. But I think it will be accepted someday. You'll know America is comfortable with Buddhism when the groceries offer sales on rice and tofu for Vesak.
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