"Is Religion Losing its Grip?"

[indigobusiness]

- THE GREAT DEBATE -

"Is Religion Losing its Grip?"
In the second edition of Life and Death, we published a transcript of a debate held in April last year between four experts on religion. The furore which this seemingly innocuous event created was astounding. We received hundreds of letters and phone calls responding to the many controversial issues raised. And even today, twelve months further on, many are still arguing heatedly over the implications of that debate. Since I know many of you missed out on a copy of Edition #2, we thought it would be fitting to reproduce the transcript in its entirety, opening up this important community debate to as many as possible.

There were three main participants in the discussion:


Father Gerry O'Malley - Catholic Priest from Sydney, best known for his outspoken views on the ordination of female priests.

Chandhapudra - Buddhist teacher from the United States of America, temporarily residing in Australia.

Ross Travers - President of the Australian Atheist Association

Professor Robert Black, president of The Society for the Elimination of All Truth, acted as moderator.
All four are considered to be leading experts in the subject of religion and its role in the wider community.

snip

Robert: But Chandhapudra, if what you say is true, then what do we replace it with? What safeguards could we implement to prevent people from injuring themselves with thought?

Chandhapudra: Well, naturally, I think people should turn to Buddhism. You see, I'm not advocating that Christians give up religion. In fact, I don't want anyone to give up religion at all. I simply urge them to consider Buddhism as a viable alternative. It is a religion which fulfills every function of Christianity, both societal and psychological, while at the same time being a great deal more believable for the modern mind. I guarantee you that the Buddhist teaching is a magnificent half-lie, one that will take four or five centuries at the very least to expose.

Robert: Wow! That's certainly a big claim. Can you back it up?

Chandhapudra: Look closely at its virtues. Buddhist cosmology bears a strong resemblance to the cosmology of modern physics. There are already many people saying that quantum physicists and Buddhists are pointing to the same reality - marvellous stuff! Furthermore, Buddhist philosophy articulates a Universe which is continually changing and evolving: this is an outlook which happens to be very fashionable at the moment, and it also fits in well with the current scientific theories of evolution. Now, just to place all this in some sort of context, I have been assured by some of our leading scientists that most of modern physical and biological theory is firmly entrenched and that it is virtually inconceivable that theories like quantum mechanics and Big Bang cosmology, for example, will be overturned in the near future.

Father Gerry: Oh, that's certainly comforting! What a laugh. Everyone knows that these scientists are always changing their theories every couple of years or so.

snip

http://www.theabsolute.net/seat/seat1.html#gems1

[saltpoint]

1. The Buddhists have it right.

Any tradition that has as one of its principal enemies the government of China has to be doing something right.

Go, Buddhists.

[Dead_Parrot]

2. LOL - Might have that on my headstone:

"What safeguards could we implement to prevent people from injuring themselves with thought?"

[Igel]

6. Ah, but thought itself is a dangerous weapon.

At times I verge on nihilism or existentialism. I don't think thought and logic (based on verifiable facts) lead to much else.

Most traditional apologia for Christianity (or any other religion or codified quasi-religious philosophy) rests on the scientifically unverifiable and non-reproducible idea of revelation or "higher truth" or "higher good".

Consider the state of the planet in 300 million years. Apart from what my religious faith teaches--which I consider to be imminently non-rational--what difference does anything I do make? If I kill 30 million people, in 300 million years there'll be no trace of them or me. "Thou shalt not murder" and "Kill while the killing's good" have the same moral status, unless I posit some ends that I think are good, but "good" on what basis?

And since the past doesn't exist except as I remember it, and my conscience only imputes guilt as I let it, why let the past burden me. Sartre redux.

My wife, an atheist, had a saying posted on her filing cabinet to the effect that it takes a person of strong character to be an atheist.

The problem is, I think, that most people of strong character were raised by strongly moralist parents, and don't necessarily impose those morals in their kids, and rarely provide any kind of self-reinforcing set of premises for those morals. My parents reflected a strongly religious set of morals, but my father was agnostic and my mother atheist. The set of morals they handed down to me were ill-formed and foundationless. (Which led me to a very conservative church, in the search for some foundation.)

[Selwynn]

8. HAHAHAHAHAAA!!!

[H2O Man]

3. I recently bought a book

actually three copies to give to relatives for Christmas. It was Muhammad Ali's new book. We all know Ali was the loud, outspoken heavyweight champion. But since his retirement, and his dealing with Parkinson's, he has become far more powerful. One of his daughters helped him write a book of his thoughts on life. This man spends almost all of his conscious hours in silent prayer and meditation.

Ali tells of going to a meeting with religious leaders from around the globe. I think there were 16 major religious figures there. Ali was most drawn to the Dalai Lama. It's beautiful. They speak about UNITY, which is the path to enlightenment.

When the group is getting ready to end, Ali says he wanted to say something to the Dalai Lama. But he found there were "no words," just an hug. This is a common theme of enlightenment: "there are no words."

People who have climbed the mountain bring back messages. I will quote some from my Uncle, Leon Shenandoah. The first two are from his simple messages; the third is from when he addressed the United Nations:

The Only Path
"Everything is laid out for you. Your path is straight ahead of you. Sometimes it's invisible, but it's there. You may not know where it's going, but you have to follow that path. It's the path to the Creator. That's the only path there is."

The Greatest Strength
"I myself have no power. It's the people behind me who have the power. Real power comes from the Creator. It's in His hands. But if you're asking me about strength, not power, then I can say the greatest strength is gentleness."

Address to the UN General Assembly
"These are our times and responsibilities. Every human being has the sacred duty to protect the welfare of our Mother Earth, from whom all life comes. In order to do this we must recognize the enemy -- the one within us. We must begin with ourselves ...

We must live in harmony with the Natural Law and recognize that excessive exploitation can only lead to our own destruction. We cannot trade the welfare of future generations for profit now. We must abide by the Natural Law or be victims of its ultimate reality. We must stand together, the four sacred colors of man, as a family. We must abolish nuclear and conventional weapons of war. When warriors are leaders, you will have war. We must raise leaders of peace. We must unite the religions of the world as the spiritual force strong enough to prevail in peace.

It is no longer good enough to cry peace. We must act peace, live peace, and march in peace in alliance with the people of the world.

We are the spiritual energy that is thousands of times stronger than a nuclear weapon. Our energy is the combined will of all people with the spirit of the Natural World, to be of one body, one heart, and one mind for peace."

--Tadodaho Leon Shenandoah; October 25, 1985

[indigobusiness]

4. Our leaders are too prudent to risk peace.

Prudence is conservative, wisdom is liberal.

[H2O Man]

5. Our "leaders" are too damaged to know peace.

Ignorance is the violence of fear; wisdom is the enlightening power of peace.

[Tux]

7. LOL

I guarantee you that the Buddhist teaching is a magnificent half-lie, one that will take four or five centuries at the very least to expose.


This guy has to be a Zen Buddhist. Or my old psych professor....

[ayeshahaqqiqa]

9. Buddhists-Sufis-mystics

all are closely following cutting edge physics, for the reasons stated. My Pir (head of my order) studied under the Dalai Lama, and Sufis acknowledge and respect all relgions. His Holiness once said that the difference between Sufism and Buddhism is this: In Buddhism, nothing is. In Sufism, everything is. Same thing, no difference.