Buddhist monks Phra Maha Sompong Talaputto and Phra Maha Paiwan Warawanno host a chat show during a Facebook live, at a temple in Bangkok, Thailand, September 17, 2021. REUTERS
BANGKOK — Two Buddhist monks in Thailand have become social media stars with Facebook livestreams that combine traditional teachings with . Some of the country’s religious conservatives, however, are not so amused.
With an impressive fluency in youth slang, Phra Maha Paiwan Warawanno, 30, and Phra Maha Sompong Talaputto, 42, have captured the imagination of a generation who find the formal temple decorum and Sanskrit chanting of traditional Buddhism outdated and inaccessible.
On a recent Friday night, the bespectacled Paiwan set his phone up on a tripod and clipped a microphone onto his saffron robe, sitting alongside Phra Maha Sompong in a small study in Wat Soi Thong temple in Bangkok.
In the livestream that followed, the two men talked through a myriad of issues, mixing Buddhist teachings, known as Dhamma, with modern life advice and a hefty dose of humour.
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“I want Dhamma and the young generation to coexist,” Paiwan told Reuters. “Without reaching out to the young, what will be the place of religion in the future?”
Paiwan and Sompong’s weekly livestreams attract hundreds of thousands of viewers within minutes, once reaching a peak of two million.
