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saben
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On fire! |
Registered: May 2003
Messages: 1537
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A lot of that really only applies to theistic religions.
I find it hard to characterise Buddhism or Taoism in most of the terms outlined by the video.
Look at this tree. I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time [...] No matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Master Oogway
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I know that I haven't posted here much recently, but I thought we'd more-or-less agreed that just re-posting polemics from elsewhere was not really appropriate? Better to have some comments about what strikes you as good about the reposted stuff, what you agree with or disagreed with, what the resonances are in your own life? This all seems rather ... impersonal, I guess.
Anyway, I take issue with the video clip - it seems to confuse the monotheistic, evangelising, top-down prescriptive subset of religion with the whole of religion. It is, in short, desperately parochial and narrow-minded.
There's very little here that applies to (the UK flavour of)Quakers, for example (which happens to be the group with which I most closely identify) - nor to the religions practised in many tribal / non-industrial societies.
In short, I think it's juvenile, cheap, ill-researched, uninformed ... I find it vaguely offensive for those reasons. It does the practice of intelligent atheism a gross disservice.
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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I'm sorry NW...I see what Brody gave us in the video as humor and little intelligent discourse, I think that is the point.
The various religions are all made up of people, and the people in that video are the dregs of the American religious world. The Ted Haggards who preach then fornicare then preach then fornicate, gay this time, it gets our attention irrespective of the religious doctrine.
I am not at all surprised that Quakers are not shown,they have always been the invisible religion which is really more about a way of life. "Let your lives speak" is a powerful message, lead by example, the Catholic Pope should listen to that.
I am glad you have some sincere religious views, it's such a personal and internal matter. I am always suspicious of those who put their religion in my face, who are they really trying to convince?
But even here in the forum you may have religion or not, I am happy you expressed your feelings. Now sorry, I have to share that video with some friends, it is funny afterall.
Age appears to be best in four things; old wood best to burn, old wine to drink, old friends to trust, and old authors to read. (Sir Francis Bacon 1561-1626)
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saben
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On fire! |
Registered: May 2003
Messages: 1537
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The video has iconography from Taoism and Buddhism. And the list of religious books near the start includes the Tao te Ching and the Analects.
The problem isn't religion, it's monotheism and ritual belief. It's prescriptivism. In America it's most sects of Christianity.
It isn't religion that is problematic. Saying that religion is problematic is just as ill-informed position as the positions espoused by most monotheistic adherents.
I guess I've seen stuff like this so many times that it's just not funny or interesting to me. Especially when it paints all religion with such a broad brush.
Look at this tree. I cannot make it blossom when it suits me nor make it bear fruit before its time [...] No matter what you do, that seed will grow to be a peach tree. You may wish for an apple or an orange, but you will get a peach.
Master Oogway
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Chris James wrote:
> Now sorry, I have to share that video with some friends, it is funny afterall.
You see, I don't think it's possible for anyone who knows much about religions (as social or anthropological phenomena, not as an adherent of any particular sect) to find it funny - it's simply too crass. It's the kind of thing that could only be produced by people with very little exposure to radically different cultures and understanding of different ways in which religions can work ... a level of parochialism that many of us outside the USA regard as all-too-common there (whether or not such a view is justified is entirely another matter).
"The ultimate weakness of violence is that it is a descending spiral, begetting the very thing it seeks to destroy. ... Returning violence for violence multiplies violence, adding deeper darkness to a night devoid of stars." Martin Luther King
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