Those of you who broke away from a relgion, how did you do it? (Christ, minority)
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And that comes down to how you look at Buddhism. Perhaps that's the confusion.
If you go on one of the Buddhist websites (for example, NewBuddhist...which gets very repetitive) one of the most frequent debates is whether Buddhism is a religion or a philosophy.
Unfortunately, I think it is supposed to be a philosophy -- where you contemplate Buddhist teachings, test them, and reject them or bring them into your life (or, set them aside for the time being and possibly come back to them later).
Buddhism is a philosophy. It has none of the necessary components for a religion, which are a god or gods, scripture, supernatural acts, an hierarchy and an eschatology.
Sadly, over time, some men co-opted Buddhism for their own devious purposes. They couldn't just let things be.
It was bound to happen. It always does. Look at Agnosticism and Atheism. You have people trying to co-opt it for their own devious purposes.
The fact that some have done that still doesn't give rise to Buddhism as a religion.
I'm sure someone will start chanting, "Buddhist monks!" until they start frothing at the mouth and fall over backwards defecating and urinating on themselves, but that has nothing to do with anything.
The proper role of a Buddhist monk is to offer guidance, if and when a person approaches a Buddhist monk and presents a question.
You don't see Buddhist monks lording over people, or preaching on TV or profiting off of people, like christian clergy do.
I would NEVER make the above statement. Books have helped me with virtually every issue in my life I ever had. Knowledge is power.
Facts are power.
Someone's highly subjective viewpoint is neither power nor empowering. When you subscribe to someone's subjective view not based on facts, you are actually enslaving and subordinating yourself to them.
How did the bible -- a book -- help the OP? It didn't work for him, and neither are a bunch of subjective views on agnosticism and atheism written by others.
The OP will have to find his own way, and that's the only way to do it. Of course, that assumes you want the OP to be empowered and not merely an acolyte of another.
I started questioning the catholic life in early 30's. and it took my to 63 or so to off the fence of it all including the god tapes. "They" all sure did a good job on everyone.
Buddhism is a philosophy. It has none of the necessary components for a religion, which are a god or gods, scripture, supernatural acts, an hierarchy and an eschatology.
Sadly, over time, some men co-opted Buddhism for their own devious purposes. They couldn't just let things be.
It was bound to happen. It always does. Look at Agnosticism and Atheism. You have people trying to co-opt it for their own devious purposes.
The fact that some have done that still doesn't give rise to Buddhism as a religion.
I'm sure someone will start chanting, "Buddhist monks!" until they start frothing at the mouth and fall over backwards defecating and urinating on themselves, but that has nothing to do with anything.
The proper role of a Buddhist monk is to offer guidance, if and when a person approaches a Buddhist monk and presents a question.
You don't see Buddhist monks lording over people, or preaching on TV or profiting off of people, like christian clergy do.
Apparently you aren't very familiar with Theravada Buddhism in Thailand. While we may not have gods, we have lots of celestial beings, we have the Tipiktaka scriptures, we have a hierarchy (the lay people, the local monks, the abbots, and (in Thailand at least) the Supreme Sangha. And plenty of fables that involve supernatural acts.
Indeed, and they have the authority in the country, can be in your face, occasionally play the 'disrespectful to Buddhism' card, and are happy to accept converts. But it is nothing like the pushiness of evangelical Christianity or the buttonholeing on the street to proselytize (1) like islam does and nothing like the power grab for education, law and politics. The military government won't allow that and see how the junta sorted the monks out in Myanmar, if you doubt that.
I find it rather amusing that there is so much fretting over 'whether Buddhism is a religion' or not. It is a religion of course.
It has dogma
it has a book of dogma
It has temples, rites, a religious order.
It even has gods, though the point is that the gods have to work out their own 'salvation' (though I suspect they are quite happy to be gods ) and humans have to work out theirs (2)
It has, in Karma, belief in a 'supernatural entity that than be propitiated in order to obtain benefits in this life and a postulated next one ' (one of my definitions of religion (3) even without my own theory ( ) that it has to be Intelligent to work, but nobody ever reads or remembers my posts anyway
ps. Note that Thai Kingship is based on Hinduism. It was derived from the Khmer (Hindu) empire and combined the two religions when Hindu Ayutthaya defeated Buddhist Sukhothai.
(1) the one time I was 'approached' by a Buddhist monk was when i first went to Thailand in the 80's and got chatting to young monk in Wat Po. I stayed in his cell, travelled to his home in the south to meet his sister "She is good for looking" he said, and helped him practice English and he complained to me about the Dhammanikaya. "They eat ice cream after midday!!"
(2) though Mahayana has shedloads of gods, demi gods, semi-demi gods and all with intercessionary powers. If that ain't a religion, I don't know what is.
(3) which makes Scientology (with its 'Thetans') a religion also - which it is.
Last edited by TRANSPONDER; 07-11-2019 at 01:51 AM..
atheist isn't a religion but some atheist treat it like one
I'll use trans because he is the poster child of atheist that base their atheism on blind faith.
It has dogma: " ... deny everything theist can use to make atheism harder to sell.
it has a book of dogma: I see many references to god delusion"
It has temples, rites, a religious order: some atheist are trying to do that as we speak. I see many atheist get a ways )(retreats)
It even has gods, though the point is that the gods have to work out their own 'salvation' (though I suspect they are quite happy to be gods ) and humans have to work out theirs (2):
look at any anti-religious society ... some of them think they are gods.
It has, in Karma, belief in a 'supernatural entity that than be propitiated in order to obtain benefits in this life and a postulated next one ' (one of my definitions of religion (3) even without my own theory ( ) that it has to be Intelligent to work, but nobody ever reads or remembers my posts anyway :
tran's sect of atheism activity lobbied to outlaw any look at how the standard model can be linked to "karma" to show that they (religious) just misunderstand the mechanism.
Tran's sect of atheism uses 'sort-a-god as evidence against anything that weakens his statement of belief. It deploys "obscurism" as an acceptable tactic because that sect base line claims are less valid.
yeah, atheism isn't a religion per say, but only per-say.
I'm back for a day. Thank you again to all those who participated in this thread. I'm having a hard time with all this right now so I was hoping to get some insight that might help me. I don't think I am or will be atheist, I think I am more agnostic (I just don't know). Maybe that's a crutch or maybe that's just who I am. But I know that I deeply question religion (it seems so man-made, not divine) and that's the point where I am at now.
Quote:
Originally Posted by jaminhealth
I started questioning the catholic life in early 30's. and it took my to 63 or so to off the fence of it all including the god tapes. "They" all sure did a good job on everyone.
"They" did, didn't they? There is something insidious about it all. I can't put my finger on it but it's like trying to remove the smell of smoke from your house. You open the windows, air things out, run fans, but you still kind of smell the smoke and can't shake it.
I find a lot of Catholicism to be non-sense that I never really believed, I resent the institutionalized abuse (these people hurting children telling me I am a horrible sinner for having consensual sex out of marriage), and I learned in my research that a lot of sins, customs, etc to just be rooted in old practices that are no longer applicable to modern people. But at the same time, I am finding it hard to shake and I feel guilt if I don't go to church. I think a lot of it is my own fear (maybe of the unknown, maybe of being "wrong," or maybe just from having been so well indoctrinated).
Maybe I just need more time.
Quote:
Originally Posted by Tired of the Nonsense
Breaking away from religion ( I was raised Pentecostal) was exactly like breaking away from believing in Santa. Once I realized (at age thirteen) that Christian claims were too silly to be true, the illusion was broken, never to return. I was fortunate in that my parents never attempted to punish me when I announced that I was an atheist, but chose to wait out what they believed to be "a phase" I was going through. That was 57 years ago.
But honestly, losing one's belief, on faith, that a corpse returned to life and subsequently flew away is exactly like losing one's belief, on faith, that Santa has a team of flying reindeer. Once a person allows themself to freely intellectually consider the possibility that such claims might actually be nothing more than the foolish nonsense they appear to be, such claims tend to evaporate away from the weight of their own foolishness. Which is why believers put such an emphasis on blind faith. Childish beliefs, once thoroughly dispelled, are unlikely to return. Could YOU ever go back to actually believing that Santa was real? Would you even want to go back?
So this might be telling and why I struggle. I see people compare not believing in religion to not believing in Santa. Way back when, my parents had to tell me there was no Santa because (basically) I was the last kid to believe and they were afraid I would be bullied because of it. Even when they told me and explained everything, I refused to believe them and locked myself in my room. It took days for me to accept things (whereas it seems like most kids actually knew and accepted there was no Santa). So maybe there is something about my personality that clings to things longer than most would. But no, I would not go back to believing in Santa.
atheist isn't a religion but some atheist treat it like one
I'll use trans because he is the poster child of atheist that base their atheism on blind faith.
It has dogma: " ... deny everything theist can use to make atheism harder to sell.
it has a book of dogma: I see many references to god delusion"
It has temples, rites, a religious order: some atheist are trying to do that as we speak. I see many atheist get a ways )(retreats)
It even has gods, though the point is that the gods have to work out their own 'salvation' (though I suspect they are quite happy to be gods ) and humans have to work out theirs (2):
look at any anti-religious society ... some of them think they are gods.
It has, in Karma, belief in a 'supernatural entity that than be propitiated in order to obtain benefits in this life and a postulated next one ' (one of my definitions of religion (3) even without my own theory ( ) that it has to be Intelligent to work, but nobody ever reads or remembers my posts anyway :
tran's sect of atheism activity lobbied to outlaw any look at how the standard model can be linked to "karma" to show that they (religious) just misunderstand the mechanism.
Tran's sect of atheism uses 'sort-a-god as evidence against anything that weakens his statement of belief. It deploys "obscurism" as an acceptable tactic because that sect base line claims are less valid.
yeah, atheism isn't a religion per say, but only per-say.
Sometimes atheism is like the antimatter of religion: For example religion has the negative charge electron (negatron) and the atheists have the positively charged electron (positron). And even though atheism is not a religion some atheists behave as if though it is religion. IN other words anti-religion becomes a religion in antimatter form.
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and see how the junta sorted the monks out in Myanmar, if you doubt that.
) and humans have to work out theirs (2)
