EWTN News portal reports that on June 13, 2026, Cambodia’s Buddhist leadership conferred the high honorary title “Akka Mahāupāsakabuddhasāsanūpatthambhakr” — “Elder Great Lay Supporter and Upholder of the Buddha’s Dispensation” — upon Bishop Olivier Schmitthaeusler, apostolic vicar of Phnom Penh, during a ceremony at Wat Botum Vatey in the Cambodian capital. The title was conferred by Supreme Patriarch Nun Nget of Cambodia’s Mohanikaya Buddhist order and presented by Venerable Khim Sorn, the order’s third deputy supreme patriarch. The article presents this event as a heartwarming gesture of interreligious harmony, quoting Buddhist leaders on Cambodia’s constitutional framework that recognizes Buddhism as the state religion while “guaranteeing complete freedom of religious belief without coercion” and promoting “religious harmony, peaceful coexistence, and mutual respect among the different religions.” Bishop Schmitthaeusler himself declared: “Receiving the status of Akka Mahāupāsakabuddhasāsanūpatthambhakr today is a moment of profound recognition of how the Catholic Church and Buddhism walk hand-in-hand for the common good of our people and our country,” and further stated: “This is a powerful signal: when religions journey together, the world will witness true peace.” The article notes that the Catholic Church in Cambodia numbers barely 20,000 faithful out of a population of roughly 18 million Theravada Buddhists. This event is not a triumph of the faith — it is a textbook demonstration of how the post-conciliar ecumenical revolution has reduced the Catholic Church’s missionary mandate to a program of interreligious flattery, mutual congratulation, and the abandonment of Christ’s exclusive claim to be “the way, the truth, and the life” (John 14:6).
