From The Globe and Mail
Tam Nguyen sat away from the congregation during much of the service, with his eyes kept shut and palms clasped together. Mr. Tam, who lost his wife, Thanh Ha Thi Truong, his daughter and four of Ms. Thanh’s family members in last week’s mass murder, must now carry the burden of planning six funerals for the family.
Tam Nguyen participates in a ceremony to honour the victims of the mass murders at the Truc Lam Buddhist Temple in Edmonton on Sunday. (AMBER BRACKEN for The Globe and Mail)
In a special Buddhist ceremony following the Sunday prayer service at an Edmonton monastery, Mr. Tam knelt and prayed facing an altar piled with tea, fruit and other edibles. As people wept, he prepared a meal for the dead. The remainder of the congregation stood around him and chanted.
“This was the first time something like this has hit our community and it’s really painful, it’s really touched my heart,” said Nga Ho, a volunteer at the monastery.
“I couldn’t sleep last night because I was thinking of the two kids. Whatever the adults did, the kids suffered and that’s very hard.”
They may be heart-broken, grief-stricken and angry, but Edmonton’s Vietnamese community nonetheless called for peace, love and understanding a week after the worst mass murder in Alberta’s history. They prayed for the seven adults and two children who died, extending forgiveness to the 53-year-old gunman who killed their friends and family.
“Everyone needs love, like a plant needs water to survive, we need love. We need to embrace each other, even the one who was responsible,” said Phap Hoa, the chief abbot of the north Edmonton Truc Lam Monastery.
Despite frigid temperatures, more than 100 people attended, among them two family members of the victims. Of the eight who were murdered, at least six are connected to the monastery.
“The people killed could have been our husbands, our daughters, our wives or our sons,” said Thich Thien Tam, the president of the Edmonton Buddhist Research Institute. “We should not waste our emotions on anger, but direct them towards love.”
The monastery’s members sat and knelt on red mats, each facing a book of chants set on a carved wooden pedestal. The strong smell of incense wafted through the air as they chanted in English and Vietnamese for more than an hour. Above them, the deep blue prairie sky spilled through large windows.
Police believe that before 8 a.m. on Dec. 28, Phu Lam entered the home he once shared with his estranged partner Thuy Tien Truong. Inside, he killed Ms. Thuy, their eight-year-old son, Elvis Lam, and five others – her mother, Thi Dau Le; her father, Van Dang Truong; her sister, Thanh Ha Thi Truong; Ms. Thanh’s three-year-old daughter, Valentina Nguyen; and Viet Nguyen, an acquaintance of Ms. Thuy’s.
Mr. Phu’s one-year-old daughter and his wife’s eight-month-old nephew may have been in the home at the time of the murders. They were dropped off at an adult relative’s home by Mr. Phu the next morning. That relative warned police the man might be suicidal.
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