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Speech
Remarks by Ambassador Joseph A. Mussomeli, World AIDS Day 2006
U.S. Embassy Phnom Penh
December 1, 2006
Good evening. Welcome. We are delighted to see you all here tonight. We are, of course, especially delighted to have all the children from “Little Sprouts” with us to help commemorate World AIDS Day and celebrate the beginning of the Christmas Season. If there is one virtue that binds Christianity and Buddhism, it is compassion. Compassion for the poor, for the weak, for those mistreated, for those who are suffering. And we especially remember those who suffer today on World AIDS Day.
It is a not-uncommon practice to light candles on World AIDS Day, in memory of the dead and as a symbol of hope for the future. We are taking this custom one step further tonight. We are lighting up this entire corner of Phnom Penh with a display of Christmas lights here at our Embassy. These lights are not just to celebrate the start of the Christmas season—a season devoted to hope and compassion—but also to commemorate those who have died and suffer from AIDS and those who now have hope of living full lives even with AIDS.
I will end my few words with a prayer spoken by the Buddha himself, a prayer of both compassion and hope, the two forces that have drawn us here together tonight:
May all people everywhere plagued
with suffering of body and mind
be freed from their illnesses.
May those frightened cease to be afraid,
and may those enslaved be free.
May the powerless find power,
and may people befriend
one another.
May those who find themselves in trackless,
fearful wilderness --
the children, the aged, the unprotected --
be guarded by angels,
and may they swiftly attain perfect joy.