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Relationship with Religion
Can people have a healthy relationship with religion? Yes, they can. The word religion comes from the latin word “religio” meaning a body of practices. Religion is like meditation. It’s the social aspect of factionalism. It is false identification (to use a Buddhist concept) that is toxic. The interfaith movements are a powerful force for…
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Religion of Ancient Egypt
Ancient Egyptian religion can be summarized as shamanism under the influence of nationalism. Like the Native American cultures, they saw the world as a spiritual place and the relationship between the ancient tribes of Egypt changed over time before the organization of the two kingdoms. They didn’t have a Cartesian view like modern thinkers do,…
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Religion as Addiction
Is religion a new addiction of self image? Often times it is, from my observation. This is why modern organized religion is so troubled. In one case, I was taking my son to a daycare, very religious people and thought they could be trusted. They were in the atonement cycle. It turns out the male…
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Bon Religion
Bon is a Chinese religion, loosely. It’s ethnically Tibetan, but not confined to that region of China. Bon was the native shamanism, but more like the Kahuna tradition than the Native American, and is more concerned with personal state than the spirits in general. Bon’s concern was basically the same as the Kahuna path, bridging the…
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Establishment Religion
Zeitgeist means roughly “mans spirit of the age“, and their concern as a body is with the social ills we now experience. They are in a sense a party to the spiritual community, because they do have views on spirituality and religion, but they are focused more on their areas of concern than criticisms of…
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Exploring Religion
One World, Many Paths holds spirituality discussions in the virtual world of Second Life. Join us there to meet like minds and explore your path. ~~~~~ I’m an atheist, but I find religion very interesting. Especially mysticism, druidism, Wicca. It is, yes. There are so many beliefs that have shaped our world even when we…
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Practice Of Religion
Religion is from the Latin world religio, which was their word for practice of any kind. Legal is also a word that comes from the same root. It’s hard to name one body of beliefs (well, it’s really impossible), and say “There … what that is, is religion.” In fact, for as long as humanity…
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Types Of Religion
There are two general types of religion and orthodox/institutional religion is by far the most common. Science, atheism, psychology, and these have led to their very own brands of “sin” which was originally just a word meaning error. The second type could be called “living”, and even some orthodoxies have attempted a revival by attempting…
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Religion and the Priesthood by Robert Gresak
Religion is fine if it gets you through the day, or through some crisis, otherwise it is only excess baggage. I cannot remember where I read the above but they certainly are very thought-provoking, with most definitely a kernel of truth. The fact is, even as humanity now stands in the 21st century, orthodox, conventional…
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Congealed Blood
The sacred is the lifeblood of the world. When people of any culture praise whatever vision of divinity they revere, they praise that divinity for the gifts of life itself. “This is my blood… Drink it” would have been enormously offensive to the 1st century Jews because only Jehovah gets to drink blood. Excellent point.…
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Split Between Art and Religion
More than a few of the world cultures have no word for religion. They actually use their word for law, and community cohesion revolved around the insights held by the priests. In some cultures artists and priests were allies where the spirit behind the cultures law nurtured the spirit of the artist. Then they sought…
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Conflict Between Science and Religion
There is a notion held in common these days by many people, that there is somehow a conflict between science and religion. I would acknowledge that currently there is social tension between avowed atheists and members of any religion, even if the religion espouses no real dogma to be opposed to as is the case…
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Religion as Inspiration for Understanding
I will ask you friends, do you feel the larger scientific community acts with philosophical integrity? There are some scientific thinkers that do advance the notion that scientific discovery will offer change as regards society and human social ills. It tends to get around to the same idea though. You are an accident of nature,…
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Inspired and Motivated by Religion
Let’s take a step back from science… Someone noted that religion gave us something better than the pre-existing barbarity. Lets’ run with that. I personally agree with that in part. Even archaeologically many of the innovations we attribute to advanced society came not from science as many claim today, but were inspired and motivated by…
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What is Belief?
It’s my experience that even away from organized religion, people still have very strong feelings about “belief.” I think I will start with what belief ultimately is. It’s a feeling of certainty and it does not require logical support. It does require experiential support and it is necessary to human function. It is a part…