Separation of Church and State

If we have leaders who derive their governance from their religion, we do not have freedom from religion. It shall be imposed on us from the leaders' decisions.

We are granted the freedom from religion in the same way we are granted freedom of religion, by our constitution. They are one and the same. Our laws and governing bodies cannot bring in their religious beliefs without imposing religion on their constituents. Here's why:

"Freedom of religion, if it is going to apply to everyone, also requires freedom from religion. Why is that? You do not truly have the freedom to practice your religious beliefs if you are also required to adhere to any of the religious beliefs or rules of other religions." - Austin Cline

Although I do not have a problem with any governing leader to be any religion, I do oppose any law making, governance, or justification for laws based on any religion. I particularly oppose these things justified by a god. I do not believe in a god as part of my religion, so I shall not have this god imposed on me by my legislators.

Do not allow your legislators to make decisions based on religion, even if you agree with their religious views. It sets a precedent that we all will not be free from religion, and there for not free to practice our own religions as we see fit.

Keep religion out of the government. Keep kind, generous, God loving people in there if you want, but tell them to keep their religion out of it and be good people because it's simply the humanly right thing to do.

Why I Don't Worship or Believe in (a) God

I was raised Christian. It took years to figure out my relationship with the God that had been taught to me. Over the years, I examined the reasons I was told to believe. There are many things I could say about why I now don't worship, believe, or even have interest in God, but this quote pretty much sums up the basics. 

 

"Live a good life. If there are gods and they are just, then they will not care how devout you have been, but will welcome you based on the virtues you have lived by. If there are gods, but unjust, then you should not want to worship them. If there are no gods, then you will be gone, but will have lived a noble life that will live on in the memories of your loved ones." –Marcus Aurelius

Why the Bible (or any other mystical text) Is Like Harry Potter

A friend of mine explained why the Bible is like Harry Potter. I think this can extend out to anything we read, even nonfiction.

"Actually, the parts that can be "proven by recorded history" argument turns out to be bullshit.

The fact that a book can have some historically accurate facts means nothing in terms of proving it's true. For example, let's look at Harry Potter.

A thousand years from now, historians could discover that people really did have cars and radios. They could discover that Britian really had a Prime Minister. They could discover that people really did use the telephone. In fact, the year that Order of the Phoenix would have occurred in, Rowling incorporated the true detail that there was a really bad drought in Britian that summer.

None of these things can establish that Harry Potter is true. This could also be dome with ANY piece of fiction.

The bible is no different from any other piece I'm fiction in this regard. " - Mike Feigen

Will Harry Potter be the deemed penned by the Hand of God two thousand years from now, and J.K. Rowling a prophet?

Atheism and Religion Are Not the Only Choices

Here's an interesting article about being in the middle - believing, even Christian, yet not rigorously religious.

When the lines divide sides that are so far apart, where do people who are in the middle fit in?

Religion for Parents

In an article in Newsweek this week, Lisa Miller writes "he grew up in a nonobservant home and, like many people, became interested in religion when he had children." She is talking about a Rabbi who made a list of the top fifty most influential Jews.

Is this true? Many people who never thought about religion before having children, suddenly take an interest?

I thought about my own situation, and I wouldn't say that having kids has increased my interest in religion. It has, however, increased my interest in how people obtain and pass down religious beliefs - and how that translates to how we educate our children.

There is something about having children that makes us realize our own mortality. Or, by having children, we come face to face with the reality that they are living, breathing beings who we are responsible for. Perhaps these two elements of awareness do bring about a certain need for religion - to have a way to put a name on the pure connectedness we feel with our children.

I have always been interested in religion, but it wasn't until I was a parent that I recognized what I was really looking for was a way to feel connected to the universe. My children give me that. They are about as close as any of us can get to again being one with the innocence of the universe, without dying ourselves.

Maybe that's why holding an infant in our arms is so breathtaking - they have just come from the infinite nothing that is "before" life. Holding a baby is very close to touching the universe, and the source of all that is living.

Guilt That We're Not Doing

Guilt. Oh, there's so much of it to go around - especially in religion. I ask, if we feel guilty about what we aren't doing, can we ever do enough not to feel guilty anymore?

If "not doing" has such a power over us that it makes us feel bad about ourselves, how much "doing" do we need to do to make up for that power? I say, no matter how much we do, if "not doing" has that much power over us, we will never be free.

This guilt of "not doing" can drive us to fill our days with as much as we can possibly cram in. The fear of guilt can make us crazy.

Instead of "doing" to get rid of guilt, we need to get rid of the power that "should" has over us.

In the words of Deepak Chopra, create intention, but hold no attachments to the results.

That may seem counter intuitive. I mean, if we "don't care" whether things get done or not, they won't ever get done, right?

However, it actually works the other way. The more we care about whether things get done, the harder it is to do them, and when they don't get done, we feel terrible. Then, we get used to feeling so terrible when things don't get done, that we get preemptive guilt before we even have a chance to do what we need to do. Then, we start to feel guilt as soon as we decide to do something, because we've been there so many times, it's a habit, and instead of only feeling guilt when we don't do something, we feel guilt until we get it done.

However, if we have the intention, yet don't get caught up in the emotions of disappointment, we have a much higher chance of doing what we really need to do. If we don't have an attachment to the results of an intention, we can make space for things to turn out differently than we expected, and maybe, just maybe, things will actually be better than we anticipated. When we are free of guilt, we are also free to let the world work with us to decide which things we really need, and which things are really good for the universe, and which things are actually selfish, destructive or meaningless.

That's not to say that intention without attachment will get everything that we need done, done. We can never do that. No matter how hard we try, we can never get everything done. But intention without attachment gives us the freedom to let go and move one when we make a mistake. It gives us the power to make change, and the power to love ourselves and keep going when things go in an unexpected direction. This point of view gives us energy to do more. Guilt makes us tired, and then we're even less likely to get done what really needs to be done.

Guilt was a major part of my life for so long. It's really hard to love oneself when we are full of guilt. It's also hard to love and be accepting of others when we are so hard on ourselves. I'm finally learning that. Intention without attachment is exactly what I needed to learn (and to continue learning). And that's what successful people do. I can see it now, all over the place, where I never saw it before, and always wondered, "How do they do it?"

Now I know.

Love Is My Religion

Ziggy Marley and his brother David's video Love Is My Religion is on the album that won best Reggae album at the Grammy's. Hollywood has always been far more secular than the general population. But this song... this is kind of the stuff that influences people. Spirituality without religion isn't a new concept, but for our youth, and our country's Hollywood dependent culture, it is.

After watching the video, I wonder, is the concept of love "better" when it's through an organized religion? Is it something different when it's felt, and practiced, by someone who isn't saved? If love is what God is made of, does he really care whether we belong to a religious group or not, so long as we are loving? And what's worse then, in God's proverbial eyes - one who is not religious, but loves deeply the people and world around him, or one who "believes" but doesn't love anything but himself and his God?

If there is indeed some kind of judgement after I die, I'm confident that if God is good, he won't tie salvation to whether I believed in him. If there is a God, who judges, and he judges based on faith, then that kind of shallow God is not an entity I'd want to serve anyway.

Love, that's what it's all about. Whatever it takes to arrive at universal love, and deep caring for the suffering and happiness of the people around us, is fine by me. But as soon as some kind of black and white rules area slapped down on how we are supposed to arrive at love, and if we don't use THAT ONE path to arrive at love it's as if we don't love at all, it's like we're closing our eyes, and loving only the things that we think are good. What's the point of that kind of love?

Just as in life, black and white is easier to manage, easier to judge. But the truth is, life, and death, and I'm guessing the afterlife if there is any, is grey. Grey, grey and more grey. There is no black and white, except for what we want there to be, and expect there to be.

Even in love. It's all grey. I just love as much as I can, with all my heart. Ziggy Marley had it right - love is the best.

Should I Go to Church?

What's the meaning of life? Individual life, and collective life?

Spiritual exploration and practice is ultimately the search or acceptance of this meaning.

It seems to me that organized religion can bring meaning to an otherwise meaningless life. But what if one has a really clear view of their meaning? Or at least, is comfortable with where they are, and their addition to the world? Can organized religion add anything?

I've been pondering this. My meditation practice, up until now, has been solo. I've thought about going to the Universal Unitarian church near our house, but it's more of a curiosity, not compelling. I've also thought about driving downtown and sitting with the Buddhists at the temple. But I'd have to do that solo (ie without the children), and if I'm gonna do something solo, that something is either writing or exercise. If I take time to do something else solo, I'm dipping in that writing/exercise time that is already difficult to find.

So, should I go to the Universal Unitarian church and see? Or, if I'm pretty happy with my individual practice, and I"m happy gaining insight and support from my individual friends who I chat with about religion, would going to an organized worship give me anything I don't have?

Spirituality Exists Everywhere

Anyone can be spiritual. Anyone can choose not to be. It doesn't matter if one is religious or not, believes in God or not, believes in anything really.

I suppose, some of this interpretation depends on one's definition of 'spiritual'. My definition, is to be connected to the universe and everything in it. There's a lot to to with that, but that's essentially it.

The Barefoot Bum talks about atheist spirituality here.

Religion of Simplicity

ScottFree2b talks here about deeper religion and spirituality stemming from more and more simplicity, not complexity. Going deep and defining our own connection with God.

He quotes The Gift of Change: Spiritual Guidance for Living Your Best Life by Marianne Williamson, which is now on my Amazon Wishlist.

I love the idea of simplicity. Perhaps that's why I am so attracted to Buddhism. But even Buddhism seems "heavy" sometimes, with the eightfold path, and the chanting and various other things.

The basic message tho, that everything is *now*, is as simple as it gets. And that's the ONE message that hits me hardest, and wakes me up. All the other things, are complexities on this. Now is the only time we have. So whatever we're gonna do, however we're gonna live, has to happen now.

I love that. It's so simple. And so true.

Mommy, What Is God?

The vast majority of us grew up with one religion or another. Whether it be Christianity, Judaism, or Atheism, we grew up being told something about religion, and then at some point, we went through some kind of maturation process, and decided for ourselves (hopefully) whether we agree with what we were taught.

I'm probably opening Pandora's box here, but I'm going to admit, that among the many life choices that we've made that aren't traditional, one of them is to not bring our children up in any religion.

None.

My husband is atheist. I'm Buddhist. But we don't label ourselves, well, ever. In fact, I think this might be the first time I've described ourselves as such. Our beliefs are obvious, and our children know what we feel about these things. But, we haven't tried to teach them to be one way or another.

In other words, we are letting them decide, now, whether they want to be religious.

So far, they haven't shown any interest.

They've asked about God, they've gone to church with friends, they've seen me meditate and done yoga with me. And we've talked about the "big issues". But whenever we get to a topic where hubby and I have an opinion, but there's no actual fact, we tell them "I don't know the answer to that. Everyone has their own opinion. This is mine. What's yours?"

They might ask us what our opinions are of God, and the afterlife, and why I meditate. But we tell them that ultimately, they have to figure that all out themselves. In fact, that's part of being human is; to figure out the meaning of life.

We've taken this approach with pretty much everything that isn't math or otherwise completely obviously true. The vast majority of what each human "knows" is actually, just opinion.

What we know is based on what we've been taught, what we've read or seen, who we know and where we live. Our knowledge base comes from somewhere inside, from our perspective, and is shaped by weighing the information we have accumulated.

We've decide, as parents, to give as much information as we can to our kids, but what they think about it, what their final conclusions are theirs.

Just an example - the pilgrims. During Thanksgiving, we opt not to do any particular pilgram-oriented activity. We focus instead on thanking the people who are with us, and who make our lives wonderful by being there. We don't thank the pilgrims.

But, if the kids thought the pilgrims should be thanked, that'd be fine too. In other words, we talk to them about everything we know about the pilgrims; what they did, who they served, what their lives were like, why they were here, etc. And, in the end, the kids decide if they need to be thanked or not. So far, the kids haven't been all that enthusiastic about the pilgrims.

On the other hand, they don't have any negative reactions to them either. It is what it is, they get it, let's move on.

Most of what we "teach" them is not a matter of telling them how or what to think, but providing them with as much information as they can possibly stand at the moment (and often, them telling us that our info is wrong, so we do research together) and we all come to our own conclusion about it, which is often different from one another - and it's all OK.

They are still young, so I know that no matter what they think right now, there is a very high likelihood that they will change their mind at some point. And, I'm kind of hoping they do change their mind a lot. Get a different view of things. Try on different perspectives. And if they get to do that now, while they are little, then when they are adults, they won't have to break away from anything to explore their own perspectives. They will have gone through their childhood figuring out where they stand on things. And they will (hopefully) continue that practice through the rest of their lives.

A friend of mine asked if I would be upset if my children decided to be Christian or some other religion that's based on organized worship. I said, "I can't say that now, because if they do decide to do that, there will have been some kind of process that got them to that point. The process will shape my feelings about it more than the final result. So, ask me when they get there, and I'll tell you how I feel about it."

And in the end, how I feel about it isn't really that important anyway, because if my kids' process takes them there, that's their choice. My role, as a parent, is to give them as many tools as possible (and lots of space) to figure out who they are. The number one tool is the grounding of a strong and supportive family.

So, Mommy, What is God? It's exactly what you think it is, dear.

Religious Harmony

Beth over at the Daily Greensboring asks an interesting question: Can there ever been religious harmony in the world?

Her article is worth the read. And so are the comments. Here is one by Billy the Bloggin Poet which sums up the problem succinctly:

The answer is in-fact simple but sadly not easy. The only way harmony can be achieved is when everyone sees God the way I see God.

Okay, you know that ain't right but that is exactly the problem. There's nothing wrong in believing in God-- any god. There's nothing wrong in not believing in a god. Belief is simply something people have. Our beliefs are not the problem. Belief does not equal sin-- never has, never will.

The problem is in-fact inherent in EVERY religion that has ever existed: Every religion, no matter how tolerant perpetuates the idea that other ways are wrong. If religious leaders were to teach us to be open to other ideas they would be teaching themselves right out of their jobs. After all, without religious controls you've no need for religion. Religion is a self-fulfilling prophecy, its motive not to save men but to save religion. As long as religion continues to exist this fighting between the various religious and non religious groups will continue.

Missing the Religious Point

What's more important, being happy or doing "well" in life?

As if it's a choice between the two!

But Gina Gorlin seems to thinks so. Her perspective - if you choose to be happy, your life will fall apart and you'll end up on the street with a glass of sour lemonade and no life.

Imagine that a Harvard freshman, inspired by Ben-Shahar’s course, accepts the Buddhist doctrine in practice. Instead of cramming all night to pass the upcoming biology exam, he will close his textbook once the stress ensues and instead take a meditative stroll around campus. When he fails his exam, he will tell himself it doesn’t really matter; external factors cannot interfere with his sense of inner worth. After he fails the semester, and his parents refuse to fund his education further unless he improves his grades, he lets himself express his anger—giving himself “permission to be human,” as Shahar puts it. So he sleeps in the next morning to give himself time to “cool off”—perhaps missing his interview for a summer internship that would bolster his career prospects (and pay for rent). When he is out of money and his academic merits are shot, and his job at Wal-Mart starts to bore him silly, he will try to “cope” with his feeling of ineptness and his waning eagerness to act; but alas, such “negative feelings” will only mount. Life will not squeeze itself into his lemonade glass, no matter how “positive” his mindset. Faced with the painful consequences of his actions on his life and goals, his mindset, too, will deteriorate.

Practiced consistently, this “mind-over-matter” philosophy derived from Eastern mysticism cannot serve as a guide to happiness, but only as an excuse for inaction. Reality is not “in the mind of the perceiver”: no matter how hard one focuses inward, one cannot cure a toothache or build an airplane by meditation. To change the external circumstances of your life, you must take external actions.

Uhm. No. First of all, which parts of this is Shahar's actual words, and what is the author's fantasy of what happens when you respect yourself and make choices for happiness?

Secondly, she totally doesn't get the "mind-over-matter" thing. It doesn't take the pain away. Meditation doesn't make things happen.

There was a great article in Spirituality and Health magazine this month about hope. People who are happy, have hope. Hope and happiness give people permission to try difficult tasks, because they aren't afraid. The perspective of happiness gives us MORE reason to go out and live and do things, not less. Happiness means we DON'T just sit on the couch and do nothing. When people are happy, they are out in the world, doing things. Engaging. Doing what they love. And being fully alive.

Perhaps it's all psychobabble. But certainly, if meditation and respecting one's own's needs makes us happy, and makes us feel good about who we are, won't it allow us to make better choices about what we do in life? And make us WANT to do well in school, in relationships, at our jobs, in our life? Why would anyone who is happy shirk their responsibilities? Why would anyone who is truly happy not study? Why would anyone who likes who they are and have lots of hope allow themselves to fail out of inaction?

It doesn't make sense.

I think that "happiness" gets confused with "brainless moving forth doing things that feel good." That's not happiness. That's hedonism. Happiness is a state of being, and it's involves a lot of pain and suffering - but because we're happy and we're hopeful, the pain and suffering isn't the end of the world. And if it is the end of the world, why make it worse by being unhappy and spiteful?

Women Practice Religion Differently Than Men

Gwen put into words so well what I have often thought while reading about Zen Buddhism. I appreciate what Pema Chodron has to say about Zen Buddhism because she is a woman. She doesn't address it directly. You can see it in subtle ways in her writing compared to say, Thich Nhat Hanh. So much of the sitting and mindfulness practice revolves around the male way of dealing with the world.

For me, sitting does help with non-attachment and loving-kindness. But a large part of how women relate to the world is communication. When I'm stressed, sitting is hard for me, because I need to connect with another human being. Sitting helps, but what helps FAR more is to sit at a cafe with a friend, or even a stranger, and talk.

Also, men tend to internalize pain, and so sitting in silence is a natural way for them to get in touch with their emotions, or to recognize them and let them go. Women, from my experience, ARE emotion. We can't just "let them go". Our way to being non-attached to our feelings and strong emotions, and to other people is going to be a much different path than men, many of whom already have a natural non-attachment to others on an emotional level.

Whereas women can usually unattach themselves from things, it's very difficult to unattach from emotions and connections with the people in our lives. And, I think women have a harder time with the concept of beginner's mind, simply because women tend to hold on to things longer than men do (of course, always exceptions). Especially in relationships with other people.

What do you think about your religion? Do women and men practice it in different ways, and understand the concepts from a different point of view?

Yoga in Schools Is Dangerous?

I have never heard this one before: Yoga is dangerous - to your mind.

Ok, so Yoga is a practice that originated in Eastern religion and philosophy. And to be fully involved in the yoga tradition is to do so much more than the asanas that are the basis for 99% of American yoga practice. But how can it be dangerous? What is is about yoga that can taint a poor child's mind to, uhm, do bad things? Ruin the world?

What's interesting, is that this person who used to be so involved with yoga, somehow can't come up with a single actual reason that yoga is dangerous. So, what exactly is he complaining about?

What am I missing? Please help me understand what the problem is here.

Religion and Spirituality

I'm not sure the purpose of this piece, but it makes an interesting conclusion:

In our circle of friends, it is often stated that religion is for those of us busily preparing for Heaven. And spirituality is for those of us who have been to Hell and wish never again to return.

Religious Diversity in Congress

Here's an interesting breakdown of the various religions represented in congress.

I wonder how much their religious leanings effect their decisions. Shouldn't it be irrelevant?