Breeze catches the edge of a strand of prayer flags as Thanawadee Kittkhot of Dormont waits to process for Vesak, the annual Buddhist festival marking the birth, enlightenment, and death of the Buddha, on Sunday, April 28, 2019, outside the Allegheny Unitarian Universalist Church in the Mexican War Streets. The holiday is marked with the bathing of a statue of Bhudda, formal offerings, and a procession to the river, where the blessed water is dropped into the tributary to join with the rest of the water flowing throughout the rest of the world. This year, the ceremony honored world peace, especially in the wake of shootings in synagogues in California and Pittsburgh, as well as in the churches in Sri Lanka. “When you hear shootings regularly on the news, we want people to realize we all have good in us,” said Bhante Pemaratana of the Pittsburgh Buddhist Center. (Stephanie Strasburg/Post-Gazette)