The Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism stated that mascots and spiritual items (such as stone lions) inappropriate to Vietnam’s customs have been exhibited or used at communal houses,  temples, relics, state offices in many localities.

To preserve and promote the nation’s traditional culture, the Ministry urged individuals and organizations not to display or use alien, foreign-style animal stone statues unsuited to traditional culture and asked local authorities to check and remove these mascots from temples, relic sites and public places.

The Ministry of Culture, Sport and Tourism also its local Departments to strengthen the dissemination of this new regulation, supervise and regularly check the display, use, and donation of alien mascots and strange items not suitable with Vietnam’s customs, especially at cultural relic sites.

It has been reported that there have been display and use of alien mascots and strange items in communal houses, pagodas and state offices for years, especially Chinese stone lions placing on two sides of the entrance.

To explain the recent appearance of the Chinese-style stone lions in Vietnam, Assoc. Prof., Dr. Đoàn Trung Tín, Director of Vietnam Archeological Institute said due to a lack of knowledge, many Vietnamese people believe in rumors that stone lions can guard their houses and help them get rich, so they buy these animal statues to place at their homes or to donate to temples.

Most Venerable Thích Bảo Nghiêm, Vice Chairman of the Executive Council of the Central Vietnam Buddhist Sangha, stated that it is not a traditional custom to place Chinese-style stone lions in pagodas, so apart from the four traditional sacred animals (Long, Ly, Quy, Phượng), pagodas should not use other spiritual animal statues for display that are not suitable with the traditional culture of Vietnam./.