I recite in the middle of my personal chaos and everybody in the Amidado (Amida Hall), recites in the middle of his/her personal chaos. We do not transform this chaos into order or purity, we don’t think at all to purity or negativity, we just recite and the sacred sounds of sutras and Nembutsu come from Amida, carrying us, embracing us, accepting us.  

In Jodo Shinshu we leave everything to Amida Buddha, our bad karma and our good karma. We do not rely on our good karma to attain Buddhahood in the Pure Land and our bad karma does not count, only Amida is important. Recitation reminds us of this, when no matter how we feel, we continue to recite.

Also, our everyday life is sometimes good or bad, we chose what we like and reject what we don�...