A woman has filed a lawsuit accusing the leader of a Buddhist sect of coercing her into having sex after she sought blessings to help overcome a panic disorder.
The 41-year-old woman, identified only as S.H.C., is seeking unspecified damages against Grand Master Lu Sheng-yen (盧勝彥), 55, for "negligent pastoral counseling" at the Ling Shen Ching Tze Temple in Redmond, Washington. The lawsuit also accused Lu of preying on other female worshippers.
Lu moved to the US from Taiwan in the early 1980s and built the temple in Redmond in 1984.
Revered by followers as a "living Buddha," he has written scores of books on Buddhism and Taoism. His True Buddha School has about 4 million followers and more than 300 chapters worldwide, including 30 temples, according to officials at the suburban temple.
Karen Goater, a lawyer who filed the case yesterday in King County Superior Court, said Lu told the woman, who is married and has three children, that she would die if she didn't join him in an ancient "twin-body blessing," which turned out to be sexual intercourse.
The claims were denied by Colleen Barrett, a lawyer for the suburban temple, which also is named as a defendant, and by Master Teng Teck-hui, president of the temple's board of directors.
"This is the first and only allegation of this nature," Teng said in a prepared statement.
"No one at the temple has any reason to believe the accusations against Grand Master Lu are true."
Barrett said she would ask that the lawsuit be dismissed on the ground that negligent pastoral counseling is not a cause of action.
STILL COMMITTED: The US opposes any forced change to the ‘status quo’ in the Strait, but also does not seek conflict, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said US President Donald Trump’s administration released US$5.3 billion in previously frozen foreign aid, including US$870 million in security exemptions for programs in Taiwan, a list of exemptions reviewed by Reuters showed. Trump ordered a 90-day pause on foreign aid shortly after taking office on Jan. 20, halting funding for everything from programs that fight starvation and deadly diseases to providing shelters for millions of displaced people across the globe. US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who has said that all foreign assistance must align with Trump’s “America First” priorities, issued waivers late last month on military aid to Israel and Egypt, the
France’s nuclear-powered aircraft carrier and accompanying warships were in the Philippines yesterday after holding combat drills with Philippine forces in the disputed South China Sea in a show of firepower that would likely antagonize China. The Charles de Gaulle on Friday docked at Subic Bay, a former US naval base northwest of Manila, for a break after more than two months of deployment in the Indo-Pacific region. The French carrier engaged with security allies for contingency readiness and to promote regional security, including with Philippine forces, navy ships and fighter jets. They held anti-submarine warfare drills and aerial combat training on Friday in
COMBAT READINESS: The military is reviewing weaponry, personnel resources, and mobilization and recovery forces to adjust defense strategies, the defense minister said The military has released a photograph of Minister of National Defense Wellington Koo (顧立雄) appearing to sit beside a US general during the annual Han Kuang military exercises on Friday last week in a historic first. In the photo, Koo, who was presiding over the drills with high-level officers, appears to be sitting next to US Marine Corps Major General Jay Bargeron, the director of strategic planning and policy of the US Indo-Pacific Command, although only Bargeron’s name tag is visible in the seat as “J5 Maj General.” It is the first time the military has released a photo of an active
CHANGE OF MIND: The Chinese crew at first showed a willingness to cooperate, but later regretted that when the ship arrived at the port and refused to enter Togolese Republic-registered Chinese freighter Hong Tai (宏泰號) and its crew have been detained on suspicion of deliberately damaging a submarine cable connecting Taiwan proper and Penghu County, the Coast Guard Administration said in a statement yesterday. The case would be subject to a “national security-level investigation” by the Tainan District Prosecutors’ Office, it added. The administration said that it had been monitoring the ship since 7:10pm on Saturday when it appeared to be loitering in waters about 6 nautical miles (11km) northwest of Tainan’s Chiang Chun Fishing Port, adding that the ship’s location was about 0.5 nautical miles north of the No.
RSS