r/news • u/GenericKittyKat • 21h ago

Buddhist monk arrested in Thailand on suspicion of embezzling $2.8m

https://www.theguardian.com/world/2026/sep/11/thai-police-arrest-buddhist-abbot-suspicion-embezzling
582 Upvotes

97% Upvoted

29 comments sorted by

60

u/Daren_I 20h ago

In Thailand, Buddhist monks take a vow of celibacy and also renounce material possessions.

He said authorities had seized assets worth about 215m baht, including 16kg (35lb) of gold bars and jewellery and 28 land title deeds.

Police are investigating which are personal property and which belong to the temple.

If his vow is to be believed, none of it is personal property; it all belongs to someone else.

28

u/hgrub 19h ago

Thai here. I’ve read this kinda news very often in my almost 52 years. It’s either money or sex scandals, or sometime both.

12

u/CosineDanger 11h ago

The news in the U.S. seldom picks up on Buddhist scandals on the other side of the world. The average American has maybe three to five facts about Buddhism and all of them are positive.

It's probably best to keep it that way.

If suddenly we know a lot of negative info about your religion it's probably because you were found to have oil.

83

u/al0neinthecr0wd 21h ago

That's gonna be a lot of bad karma for that monk.

7

u/Denkir-the-Filtiarn 11h ago

Nah man, this is meta to tank your karma ELO and be reincarnated in a different bracket.

19

u/Visual_Fly_9638 21h ago

I saw a Buddhist monk in cuffs, he'd taken money from the wat
He'd stuffed his bank account with righteous dollar bills
But even still I can't say much because I know we're all the same
Oh yes, we all seek out to satisfy those thrills

3

u/RoadSmash 12h ago

Aka what always happens when you give one person a large majority of power and control over vast resources.

2

u/BullCityLife 19h ago

It’s always the quiet ones you have to watch out for.

4

u/Witne55 17h ago

not a very good Buddhist if you ask me

4

u/SameIdea70 11h ago

This motherfucker is gonna be a fruit fly in his next life

1

u/afternever 20h ago

That monk, he had some brass

1

u/Kolby_Jack33 19h ago

No, it seems like a lot of the stolen value was in gold, actually.

1

u/Mr_Kash 4h ago

You're being very unmonk right now, dude.

-22

u/Spare-Ant7119 21h ago

But i thought Buddhism was a good religion, unlike the Abrahamic religions. /s

23

u/Ouibeaux 21h ago

Buddhism is just as susceptible to corruption as any other religion.

21

u/MegaWeinerFarts 21h ago

If you're a Televangelist you don't need to embezzle anything. You just call it God's money and He wants you to have a fleet of Escalades.