Offerings
The Significance of Making Offerings
Making offerings to the Triple Gem is one of the devotional Buddhist practice, and a basis of merit and wholesome karma.
For instance, the offering of light represents the illuminating brilliance of wisdom, which dispels the darkness of ignorance on the path towards Enlightenment; and the offering of flowers serves as a reminder of the impermanence of all things, urging us to treasure every moment of our lives without becoming attached.
What is most important is to cultivate a pure motivation or altruistic intention when making an offering. We generate the motivation to attain enlightenment in order to benefit all mother sentient beings. Then we make the offering mindfully with devotion to the Triple Gem. Finally we dedicate the merit for the benefit of all sentient beings. Like all good deeds, an act of offering or giving leads to mental purification of greed and will bring us happiness, in accordance with the karmic law of cause and effect taught by the Buddha.