The Great Dialogue

From today's Writer's Almanac: "Only half of Vermonters say they believe in God, compared with about 70  percent of the rest of the nation. People there attend weekly services at a  much lower rate than other Americans, and a much smaller percentage say that  religion is important to them. There are, however, a disproportionately high  number of American converts to Buddhism living in Vermont, and there are several Buddhist  retreat centers through out the state."

From the Barna Group Website, today:   Posted on January 12, 2009 For much of America's history, the assumption was that if you were born in America, you would affiliate with the Christian faith. A new nationwide survey by The Barna Group, however, indicates that people's views have changed. The study discovered that half of all adults now contend that Christianity is just one of many options that Americans choose from and that a huge majority of adults pick and choose what they believe rather than adopt a church or denomination's slate of beliefs. Still, most people say their faith is becoming increasingly important as a source of personal moral guidance. Choosing a Faith The survey shows half of Americans believe the Christian faith no longer has a lock on people's hearts. Overall, 50% of the adults interviewed agreed that Christianity is no longer the faith that Americans automatically accept as their personal faith, while just 44% disagreed and 6% were not sur...

Good Morning...It has occurred to me often that religions with some sense of scientific inquiry about them [I think of Hinduism, Buddhism, Taoism, Yoga...] are growing in popularity [well, maybe not Taoism] whereas Christianity is so very focused on accepting things as true without much tangible evidence...Jesus did not experiment with meditative techniques or postulate the principles that guide nature and produce natural phenomena, nor the operating principles of Dharma and Karma - He spoke to his disciples and others about God and about man's behavior, and, about the need to believe in Him and be saved [with no mechanism involved other than faith and that God can do all things]...Now, it has been said that Islam is also gaining converts steadily - and I suspect that this is due to both a political impetus [in some situations it may be expedient to espouse Islam for one's own safety] and because it is in some ways more accessible to people - sin-debt is more simple: the balanc...

...Victor Hugo, said, ''There is one thing stronger than all the armies in the world: and  that is an idea whose time has come.'    I wonder how others are perceiving this upheaval in Africa and the middle east since the fall of Tunisia's previous government - it seems to me that once the Tunis and Egyptian conflicts were widely made know [now through all sorts of means, including social Media] the world under oppressive regimes began to catch "the Idea" -  and what of the religious components of these oppressive regimes? Seems to me there were some of these that were religious only in name, and that the man or men in charge were just military big shots...what country will be next?    There was some coverage on Thursday with NPR live interviewing a man in a rebel camp in Libya who when asked what did he think the world should do for them he said, "The US should intervene there now...not wait like they did In Tunisia and Egypt.." I thought, with so...

Good Afternoon, Friends!    I am looking for more members for the Blog - and am hoping you might pass this link below onto anyone who might be a good fit for us - you know, someone who wants to Dialogue, and who has opinions they would like to share about religion/spirituality, other types of worldviews and cultural perspectives relevant to this Dialogue...As founding members who have continued on to this point let me say THANK YOU and that I trust that our circle will grow, albeit slowly...Be sure to point out to perspective members the survey button at the bottom of the blog-page...Pax!    https://sites.google.com/site/4chandre/thegreatdialogue

From the Writer's Almanac, 2/24/2011 When Fidel Castro stepped down in 2008, people  around the world began to speculate about changes. Raul Castro [Fidel's brother who is in charge now] is very different from his brother. For one thing, Raul does not give big rousing speeches that go on for hours.  He's actually known for his 'inanimate delivery' of speeches. Within  months of assuming the office of president,Raul   allowed Cubans to own microwaves, rice cookers, DVD  players, and cell phones -- all of which had been prohibited when Fidel was  president. Unlike Fidel, Raul does not blame the U.S.  embargo as the root of all Cuba's  economic woes. Instead, Raul admits that it is Cuba's inefficient, unproductive  state-run economy that is the problem, and that the government can no longer  afford the huge subsidies -- in housing,  food, transportation, health care, retirement, etc. -- which the government  provides to Cubans in exchange for payin...

Dalai Lama Espouses Marxism: http://trueslant.com/abytharakan/2010/05/21/as-dalai-lama-embraces-red-will-marxism-help-where-hollywood-failed/

Hey everyone - see the new look!

Good Morning   I have been thinking about how the way a culture views things may have something to say about its spiritual practices...for example, are collectivist societies different qualitatively from more individualistic societies?  In the West we tend to more of an individualistic viewpoint--and maybe that contributes to our infighting in Christianity and even in other Western-adopted spiritual viewpoints? Is Buddhism more amendable to a collectivist worldview? These are the questions I have been pondering - complicating this is that Jesus did exhort us to love our neighbor, and the Bible is full of references to God loving the whole world/all nations, etc., and the apostles tell us to strive to live at peace with all mankind...this sounds collectivistic, sort of like Buddhism's practice of loving kindness for all living things, etc...or, consider Hinduism and how there exists a harmony amongst ALL things...maybe this collectivist/individualist dimension explains some of the k...

Steve/James   All good points...I am liking the progress we are making!   I would remind the readers that Jesus [not only his disciples]  is recorded as having spoken about his divinity and his impending death and Resurrection...I have read portions of apocrypha and find them much as Jim describes...I was raised catholic and the Apocrypha are valued by them for some functions...it also helps to recall that the story of Hanukkah is recorded in one of the Apocryphal Maccabees texts...I think of it this way: if I authored a work, and then someone wrote a similar work, how would I protect the original work? how would I protect the names and terms associated with it? In religious circles, orthodoxy seems to be useful, in that copyrights and other protections do not exist...without some efforts in the  direction of protecting the Word anyone and everyone can author alternative accounts, leave out important things for their own purposes and basically liable-lize what was original...if the ori...

I'm not sure it's accurate that the alternative gospels have been "unearthed." We've known about them all along (as far as I know) but have basically ignored them. The reason is that the pre-Nicene Church was already beginning to think they weren't terribly authoritative; Nicaea just made that point of view official. Have you read any of them? It's not too hard to see why they came to be regarded as of minor significance. There are notable exceptions. The Catholic concept of Hell's Harrowing comes not from the canon but the Gospel of Nicodemus. But then again, when you realize that the Harrowing of Hell depends on a very earth-centered (perhaps I should say "physical-universe-centered") view of time, you begin to see that however Christocentric it is, the myth (and I don't use it here to mean something false) the concept is flawed. When you know how the Church developed its view of scriptural authority, you tend to be a little more flexib...

Regarding:   "I would love to see some passages from "alternative gospels," ...I'd be interested to know what other qualities they share."       That would be quite a study! LOTS of work in that...

   Thank you, everyone, for the comments...I think the following verses will be instructive, too: 2 Peter 1:16 For we did not follow cunningly devised fables when we made known to you the power and coming of our Lord Jesus Christ, but were eyewitnesses of His majesty. 17 For He received from God the Father honor and glory when such a voice came to Him from the Excellent Glory:"This is My beloved Son, in whom I am well pleased."18 And we heard this voice which came from heaven when we were with Him on the holy mountain. 19 And so we have the prophetic word confirmed, a which you do well to heed as a light that shines in a dark place, until the day dawns and the morning star rises in your hearts; 20 knowing this first, that no prophecy of Scripture is of any private interpretation, a 21 for prophecy never came by the will of man, but holy men of God a spoke as they were moved by the Holy Spirit.     I value the written testimony of the "eyewitnesses," and ...

Good Morning,    This morning [on Elaine Pagel's Birthday] I am thinking about the varied alternative gospels that have been unearthed, and how people often react to their existence...my main question is, what do you think the value of these is, if any? From where I stand, if the people who are the founding members of a religion exclude alternative writings, and have detailed in their own works what the tenets of the religion are to be, I cannot see how it becomes allowable for ANY alternative document to supplant the "authorized" works...for example, "Jesus died and rose from the dead" is a primary belief of the original Christian church...should an alternative view [Jesus was only a man...alternative gospels suggest this is true]be allowed to be called "Christian?"

Welcome Back, David Moyer! Be Sure to see the Survey at the bottom of the Great Dialogue Page...

I really have trouble reading purple and blue on black. They work great on white, as does the standard black.

Something funny from the Net: Why does someone believe you when you say there are four billion stars, but check when you say the paint is wet?

Steve   Welcome back!    Yes, in religion positions are often very staunchly held to--even when it would make more sense to carefully consider and respond at a later time. I think you are on the right path with your expressed thoughts about how religious practices Are helpful to members of a society; Sadly, I suspect many Christians are ready to "fight" against what sounds incompatible with their views, rather than start first from a position of Lovingkindness, careful forethought, etc.  I have not read the posionwood Bible.   Winnie the Pooh is accessible to me - Pooh certainly had a hold on a certain calm stability in the face of adversity and change--one wonders if Owl ["WOL"] is not a good example of how seemingly learn-ed persons can be pushed about by their imperfect assessments of events? :) Anyway, I think the Heart of sharing worldviews is NOT merely saying "all viewpoints are right, must be right," [that just seems impossible...several diverse ...

Wayne, I like what you said about uncertainty. The way I see it, the less we know about a proposition, the more staunchly we tend to defend it. It happens in science too much. But it happens in religion, even more. In the end, we can know with some certainty what we feel at the moment. And with a great deal of reasoning we can be pretty sure of the proposition "I think I think; therefore I think I am." Further afield, we actually know very little. So I tend to think that the truth of a religious proposition lies not in some essence of fact, but in how we would feel about living in a group, a society, a world that embraces the same proposition. For example "all people are equal before the law." When religious ideas and practices help us to be more kind, reflective, and open to other people, I think they can help us feel better about our place in society. And they can help us be part of a happier society. It is my opinion, however, that a great deal of theolog...

…The certainty of ANYTHING can be questioned; matter is not solid but packed with spaces, Light is made of particles [or is it waves?], and an honest man is a good man—and a good man is an honest man, right? I have, for much of my life, dealt with people who—with great certainty—assert that they believe in god and in heaven, but just NOT the version of God and heaven that I believe in…They are often just as self-assured that THEIR heaven is the same one as MY heaven…but, in fact, it is never MY heaven that I am referring to…If they are correct, then it is just as likely that the heaven I am going to is DIFFERENT than the one they are going to…who will reach heaven? No one can say with any certainty…as I write this, many people are being tortured and often dying, because of their belief in Jesus Christ…not that there are no other martyrs from other religious disciplines [I know there are, and I fear for those persons, too]…But this I DO know with certainty: many Christians choose to die...