 The people who survived the bombings of Hiroshima and Nagasaki is that this should never ever happen again to another human being. They pray, they speak out, and they continue to speak, those who are still alive, that no human being should ever suffer again the way they did in Hiroshima and Nagasaki a few years ago. So here we are, their message, that other people will hear and dedicate themselves for a reason, but never using such terrible weapons. We happen to live at a moment where there is a ray of hope. There is now a nuclear weapons peace treaty in the world on July 2nd of this year, 7th of this year. 122 nations between the United Nations voted for. You might expect that nine nations that presently possess nuclear weapons, including our own the United States, the only nation to ever use the weapon have refused to join the negotiations. The passage of the treaty, the nations of France, Great Britain and the United States made it exceedingly clear that they have no intention to join this treaty. That presents us with a great challenge. For the first time, the human race can point to a treaty agreed upon by 122 nations of the abolished nuclear weapons. There is such a thing as international tradition that even nations who do not sign treaties the United States of America has refused to sign become so powerful, our own statement becomes so powerful in the world that nations that even though they do not sign the treaty begin to obey it. This gives us great peace of mind to accept this treaty, to abolish nuclear weapons. So we invite you, the Buddhist Peace Fellowship who organized this evening, invites each of us to speak from our heart, a poem, some thoughts, some feelings, a song, anything that you bring here to share with us to help us strengthen our resolve to abolish nuclear weapons. Deterrence, it's not just deterrence, that doesn't do it. So it's hoped that this treaty will take people beyond that. That's so far with the best people have come up with and it's not good enough. So I'm grateful that the countries in the UN that brought it to this were courageous. I don't want to remember all those people. So this kind of self is the most important thing. Let there be peace and let it begin with each of us. I always like the beginning of the peace walk when Mary or someone else talks about how we walk and how in every step we take there's an opportunity to meet peace and to bring peace. I'm really grateful for the chance to experience the walking through town and what felt like this wild journey of trying to cultivate peace and then being like I don't really know how to cultivate peace and then surrendering to peace and feeling waves of grief and the whole experience of it. And for me music is often a prayer, is a way of generating peace and offering peace. Just thinking about them in and of itself is just disturbing to me. Fear and wanting to protect that it takes a lot of courage for peace and so I want to do my part to advocate and to have the courage myself and try to spread the courage to others. I think it takes a lot of courage but I hope that by doing our part we can convince others to be brave and to agree to let go of these insane weapons. I mean all weapons are horrible and damaging but I can't see any downside to people agreeing to get rid of them. Anniversary of the day of the atomic bombing of Hiroshima is also approximately the time of the year in Japan of the Obon ceremony and this is a time where the spirits of family members are invited back for feasting and for parties and for dancing and at the end of the Bon Festival then they have lanterns that they set into the river to send the spirits back to where they came from. So this evening in a sense we've invited those who suffered at Hiroshima and it wore everywhere to come back and to teach us this evening to teach us, remind us, encourage us not to needlessly cause suffering and destruction of life. So as we launch the candle boats into the river you may want to think about what your highest intention is and what you would want to launch into the world, how to encourage peace in the world, how to cultivate that ground of peace within. So and to support this peaceful and prayerful spirit we'll have an ongoing chant as we go down to the river and as we launch the boats into the water and on the way down I believe Neville will be there to hand out the boats. So this is a simple chant that's in the Japanese Buddhist tradition and it's frequently used in peace walks and in support of nuclear disarmament and the words to the chant are and the literal meaning of that is hail to the lotus. But we can think of that as what the lotus is trying to teach us, the lotus that grows in the mud in this beautiful flowering and may we be like that kind of flowering that comes up out of the difficulties and the suffering of this world. So we'll do it like a car response.