Judge to Speak at Honoka‘a Hongwanji

The Honorable Judge Margaret Masunaga will be the special guest at Honoka‘a Hongwanji Buddhist Temple on Sunday, June 3, 2018, at 9 a.m. She will speak about her family history and the strong people who helped shape her life.

Judge Margaret Masunaga. Courtesy photo.

During WWII, Judge Masunaga’s parents were among the 120,000 persons of Japanese ancestry, mostly U.S. citizens, confined in internment camps across the country. Her mother, Lillian Taniguchi Kuroda, grew up in the Jerome, Arkansas camp and graduated from high school on May 8, 1943. Her father was also interned, and bullied into giving up his American citizenship, until after the war, when he hired and attorney to have it re-instated.

Judge Masunaga is the Hawai‘i District Court Judge of the Third Circuit in Kona, a graduate of the University of California at Berkeley and the University of the Pacific McGeorge School of Law. A public servant for 22 years, she served as Deputy Corporation Counsel and Deputy Planning Director for the Count,y and as Deputy Attorney General for the State of Hawai‘i. Formerly, Judge Masunaga chaired the Hawai‘i State Commission on the Status of Women, was a delegate to the White House Forum on Women & the Economy, and on the Board of Governors of the Hawai‘i Community Foundation and Kona Hongwanji Buddhist Temple.

She is also a contributor to the American Bar Association publication, “Dear Sisters, Dear Daughters: Strategies for Success for Multicultural Women Attorneys” on the occasion of the Buddhist temples’ commemoration of the life of Lady Eshinni, wife of the founder of Jodo Shinshu Buddhism, Shinran Shonin. Lady Eshinni was instrumental in establishing the organization of temples now known as the Hongwanji, the most prevalent form of Buddhism in Japan. They presently number over 10,000 throughout the world, including Hawai‘i and elsewhere in the United States, Canada, South America and Europe.

The public is invited to hear Judge Masunaga make her presentation in the main temple, followed by a reception. There is no admission fee, but donations and contributions are encouraged. For additional information, visit the temple website.