Here’s a good read about Buddhism in South Korea from the Wall Street Journal, written by a foreigner living and working in Seoul. The article says Buddha has had a recent resurgence achieved partly through imitating many of the Christians’ social-propagation techniques. Incidentally, I live next to a Buddhist Kindergarten.

I think this idea would surprise a lot of Westerners. The Buddhism I encountered in the Bay Area was always the Zen-influenced, touchy-feely variety, perhaps influenced by the 1960s, by people like Allen Ginsberg and Gary Snyder, as much as Buddhism itself. I was shocked when I arrived in Korea, made my way to a temple on my second day in the country, and was mildly hounded on the street to buy a drawing of Buddha.  

I happened upon a Buddha birthday parade on Saturday night in Busan. Different temples throughout the city were represented. It confirmed something I’d often thought — that most of the people practicing Buddhism in Korea are middle-aged housewives. Not that this parade was the perfect barometer, but I’d say 75% of the people in the parade were women between the ages of 40-55. Indeed this is the case in my wife’s family. Both my wife’s mother and grandmother are Buddhist.

The article asserts that about a quarter of all South Koreans now call themselves Buddhists, up from less than 10% a century ago.