Ling Yen Mountain Temple

The Ling Yen Mountain Temple in Richmond, British Columbia, Canada is a Buddhist monastery, designed by Pacific Rim Architecture in the Chinese palatial style and completed in 1996. The temple has about 10,000 members in Greater Vancouver and several dozen resident monastics.TraditionThe temple is in the Pure Land tradition of Ling Yen Shan near Suzhou, Jiangsu, China. It is an offshoot of Ling Yen Shan monastery near Puli, Nantou, Taiwan, which was founded by Master Miao Lien in 1984.LocationLocated on No. 5 Road in Richmond near Williams Road, the Ling Yen Mountain Temple is located within a 20-minute drive from Vancouver, parts of Richmond and other Metro Vancouver municipalities with a significant Buddhist population.The temple is on a stretch of Richmond's No. 5 Road that is thick with regional temples, churches, mosques, and associated schools, which has been dubbed Richmond's "Highway to Heaven". The area is within British Columbia's Agricultural Land Reserve. The temple is one of few religious establishments there to have complied with the city's requirement that a certain portion of the properties be actively farmed. They have established an orchard of apple and pear trees.Plans for expansionWith 10,000 worshippers and over 8,000 community and school group visits over the years, the Temple is proposing an expansion of the temple on its land in addition to the current facilities. The new facilities are to better serve visitors, worshippers and practitioners as an all-encompassing international Buddhist centre. The new facility is envisioned to provide multi-purpose space and comprehensive services to allow the general public to delve deeply into Buddhism.