What do you believe, or not? Another religion thread ... (Page 2)

You're making me blush ...

Thanks for sharing. It is the bolded part that has spoke the most truth to my heart. I have caused plenty of my own. I have endeavored to change that and that endeavor is what has opened me up to "something else". What I have read about Buddhism is very palatable to me.

There was a time when I liked to think I had everything figured out, I was mistaken... come to find out, people had me figured out 5000 years ago. It's a trippy ride we are on isn't it?

The older I get, the less I know.

You might gain a better understanding by reading Buddhism Plain & Simple. It's a quick read, very accessible, strips away rituals and goes to the essence of Buddhist thought. I found Thich Nhat Hanh's book, Old Path, White Clouds: Walking In the Footsteps of The Buddha to be a helpful read on the Buddha's life and what he actually taught.

I really like the podcasts issued by the Insight Meditation Center. Gil Fronsdal is a wonderful teacher. I use iTunes to download them.

Great links!

I have found Thich Nhat Hanh to be a very clear and accessible writer.

As for Buddhist philosophy that I've personally found deeply helpful and touching ... Pema Chodron. Hard to even write her name because her writings have had such a profound effect on me.

Pema manages to penetrate without piercing. She is immensely gentle in administering a good zen slap.

Pema follows the Shambhala tradition.

HAHAHAHA! So very well put.

I believe I can fly
I believe I can touch the sky

This is my approach to the swim.   

Some things I don't believe:

1. The universe, or God, or whatever you want to call it does not care about me personally.
2. I do not believe in proselytizing. I am willing to talk about religion with anyone, but don't give me a sales pitch.
3. I do not believe that my invisible friend can beat up your invisible friend, nor vice-versa.
4. I do not believe that God, the Universe. FSM or whatever cares about politics.
5. I do not believe in fighting over religion.
6. I don't believe that one can "get off scott-free just by saying so". We are responsible for our actions.

I believe in...

• Loving others and being loved yourself.
• Being nice to others and helping them when you can.
• Having a fridge with beer to give out to friends, family, guests, strangers...
• Loaning out my power tools.
• Trying not to have any regrets.
• Being happy.
• Respecting others.
• Enjoying diversity and differences.
• Seeing the beauty in all the little things.
• Treasuring this planet as the only one we have.
• Making the world just a little bit better.
• Laughing and not taking things too seriously.

By religion, I'm Jewish.  But by life, I'm Bigfuzzydougish. 

I believe that if we stop learning, we stop living.

I believe that what I used to believe in doesn't coincide with what I've learned thus far, but that does not mean that I can discount all of it.

Apologies in advance if this is a little dis-jointed.  I'm typing as they come to me.

• I believe that it doesn't matter if we believe in religion.
• I believe that there is something larger than me that has a "life force" that guides us.
• I believe in Karma.  A lot.
• I believe that as long as I live my life in a manner that I can be proud of, that my family can be proud of, and that has a positive impact on my children, I good with it.
• I believe that my children are the greatest part of whatever legacy I may leave and that I better do a good job of making sure that it's a positive legacy.
• I believe that, for the most part, I have a pretty great life in spite of the hardships.
• I believe that I've done some REALLY dumb things in life and my family loves me anyway.
• I believe that I'm not a perfect person but I'm doing the best that I can.
• I believe that I don't think you can live a life of "sin" and be forgiven by saying you believe in something at a moment in time.  Forgiveness is provided by the actions of your life not a moment of belief at that "Oh, Sh*t" moment.

I'm sure there's more but I believe that's all I've got right now.

Genuinely curious ... if there is a god, and he did have the sort of power ascribed to him, what would your job description for him be, and how would you determine how well he'd fulfilled that job to be worthy of your worship?

Things changed for me when I stopped listening to other's interpretation of that God and started seeking my own.

It also helped when I stopped blaming God for the deeds done by Man. Not saying I believe in God, but things looked a lot different after that.

I like to describe myself as an agnostic jew-bu; although to be more accurate, I am more of a non-theist. The universe does not really care about me personally. And I do not think a "prime mover" does so either. The watchmaker analogy leaves me cold - I've owned many watches, and never did their creators seek me out to find out how the watch was doing. They worked or they didn't, and I liked them or I didn't. And ultimately, most of them died and that was that. Pascal's wager also doesn't work - too many competing and incompatible hypothesis to say "if I believe this model, I'll be OK" - since some models require active rejection of others.  So the notion of a personal and invested god makes no sense for me. If it gives someone else's life meaning, well good for them. But without that, there is no real point in trying to imagine god or gods.

I also consider myself a jew-bu, since having been born of the tribe, it is still a part of my heritage (and unlike being, say, Italian, being jewish is linked with both the culture and the religion); but I find the Buddha's teachings about the root causes of unhappiness to make a lot of sense (removing from them all the accumulated mysticism and ritual - if I wanted that, I'd have stuck with judaism!)

Of course that line out of Constantine is always good:

"God is a kid with an ant farm."

Also it needs to be noted the difference between the western idea of reincarnation and the Dharmic idea of reincarnation.  The Abrahamic traditions (or really those that evolved it over the last 2000 years) view reincarnation as rebirth.  One person dies and some of the life force, sole, memories, brain, etc gets put into a new body.  Some thing that through some kind of mystic ceremony, those previous lives can be accessed.  That's rebirth.

Reincarnation is different.  Over your lifetime, you accumulate all the good and bad things you do.  When you die, this accumulation (i.e. karma) gets transferred to a new being.  And so on and so on forever.  Or until nirvana.

A lot of it can be real silly.  Some traditions say there are 7 level (or is it 9) of existence.  Like all things Buddhism, people are in the middle.  On one end of the scale, you've got things like Titans and gods.  On the other end, you've got ghosts and deamons.  Do too much bad stuff, you reincarnate as something evil.  Do too much good, you'll reincarnate as something good.  But only in the middle, as a human, is nirvana even possible.

But, to answer the OP, I'm an atheistic Buddhist.

Ditto! And if you don't believe me, see the thread I started on dating. Can't we talk about scotch or something else equally as polarizing?

My beliefs took almost 50 years to evolve to where they are today, are still somewhat in flux, and are deeply personal. Not exactly fodder for BT.

For what i know so far all humans meet the same fate, death. It is an inevitable part of life, what happens after is the ultimate mystery. From what we can observe death is the ultimate void where we cease to exist. In the face of such knowledge i dare to believe that after death we humans reach a different fate, i believe we are reincarnated to suffer life again. The human soul is like a canvas, with each life a portrait is painted, unique for everyone, and when we die it is erased. We must live on until we cease our suffering and reach nirvana, at which point we become one with the universe.

well thats as brief as i can put it, otherwise i can go on forever!