Religions and festivals in What we will learn,

• The four main religions in Sri Lanka

• The religious places

• The religious festivals There are four main religions: • • Hinduism • Christianity • Islam Buddhism tsthe mostItis popular religion

About 70% of Sri Lankan epeis buddhistpeople

InBuddhism, we follow the teachings of Lord Buddha

vr ,Every on full moon, we aea religioushave holiday to worship. uditpeopleBuddhist go to the temple to pray and worship.

Alltemples have three main places to worship; The 'Vehera' The bo-Tree The shelter where Lord Buddha statue is. • The three main Religious festivals are, Festival Festival Asala Festival

• They are three of the twelve Full-Moon days of the year. Every month, the day of full moon is called ' Day'

• It's a national holiday for buddhists to observe their religion. ea Poya day Vesak tsh day when we celebrateItisthe hbrh enlightment andthebirth, et of Lord Buddha. death ts beautiful celebration,It'sa seilybecause of the especially atrsand Pandols thatLanterns eoae every city in Sri decorates Lanka. Poson Poya day

It is the day when we first got • .

There is a story behind it, and • every decoration on this day is based on this story. Asala Poya day

eeert the start of theWecelebrate an season on this day inrainy July.

ttrsby bringing out theItstarts Tooth Relic into the streets on hbc of an elephant intheback an xrvgn parade. extravagant Hinduism It is the religion of many Tamil people, especially in the north of Sri Lanka.

In Hinduism, many gods are followed, and they worship and pray to the gods by serving them different food and fruit.

One of their main Gods is God Shiva. • The worship at Kovil's, which are tall, colorful structures that shows Gods and heaven, where Gods are.

• Kovils always smell really sweet of flowers and Incense sticks. n of their main festivalsOne is hiogl which is a HarvestThaipongal, etvlfor the Sun god. festival

hymake a special rice dishThey with Coconut milk and spices, hc is cooked under thewhich sunlight.

n they also create And oehn beautiful calledsomething Klm with colored rice '' risand Betel leaves ongrains the floor. Sinhala and Tamil New Year • Sinhala and Tamil New year is a New Year celebration done by both Buddhists and Hindus in Sri Lanka

• Its a long festival starting from 12th of April to 18th of April.

• There are so many traditions done in this festival, which are done using a special calender every year. Some of the traditions include Sharing different traditional dishes after lightening an oil lamp, exchanging money with each other andapplying herbal oils on your hair.

Itis a of cultural games as well.

Itis one of the biggest and most imortant festivals in Sri Lanka, so lets experience it with a little video. Christianity sr Lanka got ChristianityAsSri rmh Colonizers, It is prettyfromthe uhthe same as it is much vrweeelse in the world.everywhere

hitasin Sri Lanka goChristians to hrh celebrate all the church, oiasand festivals. Theyholidays aethe same divisions ashave well.

hrfr all Christians Therefore celebrate , , n so on and Islam sa is one of the most popularIslam religions in the world, so the rdtosare the same as they aretraditions all over the world hyfollow the teachings of HolyThey Prophet Muhammad and writings nh Quaran. inthe hi prayers are done in mosquesTheir with a special prayer done on Fridays. hi most important festivals includeTheir Ramazan and Holy Prophet's day. aaa celebrates the endRamazan of atn that continued on forfasting a e weeks, based on a specialfew calender.

tscelebrated with a feastItis of odhrdbetween families,foodshared ieBiriyani and Watalappan.like However,

• the special thing about Sri Lanka is having so many religions and cultures AND sharing them with each other.

• For an example, seeing Vesak Decorations, Celebrating Christmas, drawing 'Kolam' and sharing food in Ramazan is common for everyone.

• And it is very, very important for us as well. Summary on religions

Religions

Buddhism Hinduism Christianity Islamism

• Lord Buddha's • Different gods; ex, • Same deities and • Holy Prophet Teachings God Shiva. celebrations and Muhammad's • Place: Temple • Place: Kowil writings as they teachings. • Festivals: • Festivals: are in western • Place; Mosque Vesak Poya Thaipongal, . • Festivals: day, Poson , Mahashiva Ramazan, Holy Poya day, Esala rathri. Prophet's Poya day birthday Sinhala and Tamil New Year Questions??