China Bans Tibettan Buddhists from reincarnating

Posted on February 21, 2011 by John

The title says it all – China will not allow monks to reincarnate without the government’s express permission.

As incredibly asinine and silly as this seems at first glance, the goal of this policy is not so much due to the government’s belief in reincarnation but rather a further attempt to curtail the freedoms of Tibetans. The reason being that to Tibetan Buddhists, only the wisest monks are recognized as having reincarnated, and those who are recognized would naturally become leaders of the religion as well as community. Thus by not allowing Tibetans to declare that reincarnation has happened, the Chinese government would directly undermine the faith as practiced in the region.

The act of the state interfering in religious tenets directly is quite despicable, but is as expected of an authoritarian government like China. I wonder however if this act may even achieve the opposite effect intended in some respects. Chinese people these days have been utilizing the freedom provided by the Internet, and enormous amounts of information – be it insightful criticisms of the government or conspiracy theories and urban legends – circulate very easily and quickly. Enacting such a silly act may strengthen belief in the possibility of reincarnation in the minds of the common people by giving it a significant degree of credibility. After all, Buddhist beliefs are very wide-spread in China.

It will be interesting to see what the reaction to this ridiculously draconian law will be in the coming months.

The proper way to treat religion

Posted on November 24, 2010 by Crommunist

It will come as no surprise to anyone who’s been here for longer than a month that I’m no great fan of religion. Unlike some of my fellow authors here, I am no great fan of any religion. I see it rather like sickle cell anemia – sure it might prevent some cases of malaria, but if we can find a way to prevent malaria on its own, there’s no value in keeping the anemia gene. Sure, some people get comfort or moral instruction from religion, but it’s not a necessary condition; if we can encourage people to find other ways to be happy and moral, we should absolutely divest ourselves of the baggage of belief without evidence.

However, and I think all the authors would agree with me here, I am 100% opposed to forcing people to abandon their beliefs. Not only is it not effective, but it is a violation of the principle of respect for individual autonomy. A person has a right to the privacy of their own thoughts, and if belief in something supernatural helps you get to sleep at night then that’s your business. I’m not going to feign respect for your beliefs and will question them whenever appropriate, but I will absolutely respect your right to have them free of actual oppression by force.

For the same reason, I am opposed to the destruction of religious artifacts. Aside from the fact that it is tyrannical and unethical (as I have described above), it is essentially the destruction of our history. Just as our bodies showcase the vestiges of our evolutionary history and contain an accounting of the organs and structures that we no longer have use for, so too should our society have an accounting of its history and contain memorials of the ideas and beliefs we no longer have use for. We can know a great deal, for example, about the downfalls of socialism and communism because we have records of what happens when those political theories are implemented wholesale. So too for geocentrism, caloric theory, miasma and the luminiferous ether. Without having records of those thoughts and why they failed, we are more likely to fall under their sway again (“those who fail to learn from history…”).

And it is for all these reasons that this particular news item caught my eye:

Afghan archaeologists say they are racing against time to salvage a major 7th Century religious site unearthed along the famous Silk Road. They have warned that the 2,600-year-old Buddhist monastery will be largely destroyed once work at a mine begins.

A Chinese company is eager to develop what they say is the world’s second-biggest unexploited copper mine which lies beneath the ruins at the site.

The caricature of atheists is perhaps that we would crow triumph and demand that these silly monuments to superstition be destroyed without hesitation. The reality is much to the contrary – while we might not put much stock (hopefully no stock) in the beliefs that spawned such a monastery, we recognize that it is a vital link to our history as a species. Destroying such artifacts would be a loss to us all, not just those who practice Buddhism.

Hanging over the discovery, correspondents say, is the memory of the Buddhas of Bamiyan – Buddhist statues towering up to 180ft (54.86m) high in central Afghanistan that were dynamited in 2001 by the Taliban, who considered them symbols of paganism.

It has been said before by better writers than I, but it is not atheists that religious adherents should really fear. While they may find our criticism of their beliefs distasteful, there is something to be said about the power of words vis a vis sticks and stones (or, for that matter, nitroglycerene). It is a great tragedy to history and humanity that this site will be bulldozed before it can be sufficiently explored, but at least some portion of its contents can be salvaged.

This is the proper way to treat religion – as a societal quirk that connects us to our history, a system of thought that kept us alive when we didn’t know any better, and as a reflection of our fractured humanity.

Buddhism: still a religion

Posted on October 19, 2010 by Crommunist

There is a really tiresome lie that gets a lot of play, even among the atheist community. That lie is that religious folks just want to be left alone to practice on their own, and that atheists should just pipe down and not be so hostile to religion. After all, it’s those militant, pushy, arrogant atheists that are causing all of the real problems, right? In the same way that Republicans blame guys like Van Jones and Tim Wise for causing the racism problem, or sexists blame feminists for anti-woman backlash, atheists seem like an easy target for ire. Apparently talking about the problem is tantamount to causation, just like my yelling “look out!” causes you to get run over by that bus. Stupid me.

There is a far more tempting lie that Buddhism and other “Eastern” religions are somehow not religions at all; that sitting in quiet contemplation and thinking happy thoughts about Nirvana and the cycle of being is somehow safe. And if that was an accurate description of Buddhism, I’d be all for it. However, the cake is a lie:

Child rights activists in Sri Lanka have criticised a plan by the prime minister to ordain 2,600 boys as Buddhist monks by next May. Prime Minister DM Jayaratne says the move is aimed at boosting Buddhism and lifting young people out of poverty. Activists say the boys are too young to be ordained. There have also been reports of sexual abuse in the temples, strenuously denied by the authorities.

Imagine for a moment that the Catholic Church of Canada or an evangelical church in the United States or a Sikh temple instituted a policy (with government sanction, incidentally) whereby 10 year-old children were separated from their families (permanently) and indoctrinated in that tradition. Imagine that before they are even able to reach the age of reason, their entire view of the world is shaped based on archaic teachings – teachings untouched by millennia of new thought and progress. Imagine that this kind of policy was implemented “for the good of the children.” How long would it take you to call your MP and demand that this evil practice be condemned?

Ah, but it’s a religious practice, so we mustn’t say anything too mean or disrespectful and risk losing allies, right?

I’m sure that was much the same conversation Canadians were having back in the days of Residential Schools. Mustn’t offend the Church. It does good works. After all who knows? Maybe these kids will be better off! We’re taking them away from savagery and poverty, teaching them English, and instilling good religious values in them at the same time. Those abuse reports? Meh, just a few isolated complaints from kids who are probably lying anyway.

The fact is that when we give too much respect for “religious traditions”, and insist that we have many valuable lessons to learn from religion, and repeatedly affirm that religious people are innately good and just want to be left alone, we pave the road for this kind of thing to happen again and again. I’m baffled, frankly, that we seem insistent to throw ourselves down this road again. I am writing a letter to my Member of Parliament, as well as Lawrence Canon (although I don’t have much hope that he’ll do anything besides blame Michael Ignatieff), asking him to denounce this looming atrocity.

The problem is not a religion, or even some religions. The problem is religion – the amount of undeserved power and respect it is allowed to have, and our baffling reluctance to criticize its actions. It doesn’t matter if you follow the Buddha, Yahweh, or worship the wax in your neighbour’s ears – religion is based on faulty premises and has shown its moral hypocrisy and perversion again and again. How many passes do we want to give it? Apparently in Sri Lanka, 2,600 is the magic number.

Keeping Faith Alive in Contemporary Society

Posted on October 17, 2010 by Katie

Joe and I attended the World Religion’s Conference on Saturday held by the Ahmadiyya Muslim Community at the University of Waterloo. The overall theme for the conference was “keeping faith alive in contemporary society”, however it seemed like this topic rarely (if ever) came up in the presentations… Well, to be fair they all talked about what their religions do and why these things *should* continue and why they *might* continue, but I thought there would be a much stronger focus on strategies and plans for keeping faith alive by working together. My take on the talks will be incredibly different than Joe’s, so I hope that you’ll read both of our accounts.

There were 8 religions so I will address each of them with my overall feeling/response now…some of them I didn’t really listen or like, so I won’t say much, but 3 or 4 of them I really liked. Please understand that what I took out of each talk my be extremely different than what the main concept may have actually been… but we all take out what we need/want to.

Hinduism with Chander Khanna of the Hindu Institute of Learning

The overarching concept of his talk was that all of the religions on the stage, including atheism, were simply all the same thing. (He called atheists “delayed” in their faith and procrastinators…heh.) He elaborated on this by saying that we’re all different paths heading toward a common place and that the future of faith in contemporary society is hidden inside of this.

His hope, that I agree with, is that there will be a meeting point at the center that will involved many levels of understanding and will essentially morph into new religions of the future. In the future people will look back on the Christianity, Islam and Buddhism that we have today and talk about how strange it all seems. The future religions understand each other, including the secular humanists’ perspectives. What a lovely idea! Too bad he didn’t have any suggestions on how to do this, he sort of just said it would happen all on its own. Given the history of Christianity and Islam I highly doubt it. I think that there still needs to be some major activism for calming down extremists so that we actually have a chance at a world full of different religions, celebrating their differences and working together on big issues.

He continued…

The real risk to Religion does not come from Contemporary Society with its discoveries of Science or rising affluence by from the viruses, the infections which have distorted, hijacked and vilified some of the basic tenets for political and societal expediencies.

…and I couldn’t agree more. He gave some examples of how religion has been used “out of context” to create great suffering in the world such as with the caste system in India where 70-80% of all Indian poor are “untouchables”. People too often use bits and pieces of religions to advance their own points of view or political agenda, this is not what religion is for. It is nice to think of a time when it won’t be used for this.

Humanism with Stuart Bechman of the Atheist Alliance International

You can all take great pleasure in knowing that secular humanism and atheism was represented in a very eloquent and intelligent fashion by the president of the atheist alliance international, Stuart Bechman. While he might look a little bit like a used car salesman he did an extraordinary job defending the secular position in front of an auditorium filled with religious people (except Joe). He did a lot of things I liked and a couple things I didn’t like (which I forgave him for later because other people did it too).

He did the ever-inspiring and never-old “the universe is awe inspiring” speech saying that “faith” for atheists is in humanity. He expanded on this by saying it is important to have an understanding of life, the universe and everything in order to make right decisions for the future. For the wellbeing of future generations, he says, it is important to use our knowledge and science to come to good decisions.

What I didn’t like: He said that we are all essentially Gods because we shape the world of tomorrow. Maybe it’s the Christian in me, but I just didn’t think it was entirely appropriate to call humans “gods”. Not only does it make him seem like he has a bit of an inflated ego but it is also pretty much as blasphemous as you can get…lol. Which I don’t have a problem with, but some might. He also reminded everyone that passion is not truth and that the religious need to question their faith and dogma because humans are gullible and emotional. At first I had a problem with this because he seemed like he was trying to de-convert people, but then I realized that pretty much everyone was trying to convert someone so I let it slide. But I also don’t like the underlying assumption that faith materializes because a person is gullible and emotional. People of mature faith don’t grow their faith because they are emotional, they do it because they are seeking and finding.

It is worth noting that he was the only panel member who didn’t promote working together for a better future.

Judaism with Dr. Daniel Maoz a professor of Jewish studies

To be completely honest… I tried to listen to him, I really really really did.

But the hat he has on in the picture – he wore it through his entire talk and it was so distracting because you couldn’t see his eyes at all… all you could see was a hat. An ugly hat.

And he talked really slow… and for like 5 minutes he was talking about learning how to play bridge and how it is really hard to play bridge until you actually do it… and then it turned out that the bridge-playing analogy wasn’t even central to his point, it was just to demonstrate that he understood that we wouldn’t understand Judaism as outsiders…

Anyway, …I fell asleep. Joe listened tho, ask him.

Christianity with Charles Van Alphen from St. Michaeil RC Parish

He was a Catholic and I’m United so we did totally not see eye-to-eye on the appropriate amount of scripture to be saying or on the basic groundings of Christianity…however…the meat of his talk was actually quite good.

He advocated that the future of faith lies in having a mature understanding of faith in order to put that faith and religion into the context of today and tomorrow. He said that the context today is love, and that Jesus preached love and that we need to focus on this. The obsession with dogma, he argues, has created too much conflict and hate. The bible was created by a group of people with an agenda to advance – so there are things that no longer fit into the context of today and for faith to be alive tomorrow, it needs to catch up with this context.

I think the reasons atheists will have a hard time understanding this is because of their lack of a mature faith… I know hearing/reading that will piss you all off, but I don’t care. You don’t have mature faith and therefore you think religion is only what you read and these shallow definitions of God (ie: comparing God to fairies in a garden) are remotely accurate.

Buddhism with Dr. Christopher Ross a professor in Religion and Culture

Aboriginal Spirituality with Walter Cooke of the Elder Counsel Ojibway Cree Bear Clan

I don’t have a single note taken down for either of these guys…. Despite the fact that Dr. Ross had a wonderful English accent and it was sort of promising when he said we didn’t need to keep faith alive if it was dying… to just let it die if it has no purpose… But, then he just went off about Buddhism in Western society and stuff.

I went to the conference to see the aboriginal guy! But it was pretty bad, too. I’m taking a class right now on aboriginals and it is really focused on the politics of aboriginal cultures and how they are trying to fit their culture and spirituality into a changing world. There are some amazing scholars out there with good ideas about how to do it very effectively, but this guy wasn’t one of them. Not even close. It was too bad, really…. aboriginals are finding ways to resist globalization on local levels and have their culture represented in larger political bodies – this is key in keeping aboriginal faith and spirituality alive.

Islam with Mubarak A. Nazir from the Ahmadiyya Muslim Jama ‘at Canada

Much to my surprise Nazir was my favorite speaker (enough that Joe said “you’re converting to Islam now, aren’t you?”). I’m not quite sure what it was about him, but he was vibrant, confident and very charming.

He played up on the fact that similarities are not news worthy. That events that are free (like this conference) are not filled up to the brim because there is no conflict. But these are the events with substance and with information that can help make the world a more loving place. Debates about religion vs. science/atheism, debates about the mosque – these are all popular because the create friction and hate, which people thrive off of. But we need to learn to stop and think. To love your mind, yourself, your neighbour and the poor to create a better world.

The future of faith is in the contemplation and conversation with oneself and with others who are more mature in their faith. Thus we need to stop and think about what we know, reflect on what we know and let our minds wander.

“You can put books on a jackass and it won’t become educated.”

Education isn’t always in the books and it isn’t always in the classroom or the lab. There is much to be learned in the faith world and innature that we should be allowing ourselves to be more exposed to. This is such a great thing that people should internalize. Scientific knowledge is NOT the only knowledge that is out there.

Yeah. I said it.

Sikhism with Kulvir Singh Gill from Sikh Centennial Foundation and Seva Food Bank

He was the youngest on the panel and really well spoken. He is really the only person who outlined two very specific strategies for keeping faith alive in contemporary society.

1. We (people in religion) need to face the plurality of the modern world. Each person needs to accept that there is no one single path and that all paths lead to the same God. Too many faiths have been overly focused on numbers – how many houses of worship have they opened, how many followers did they gain – but they need to refocus. He expanded on this by telling a story about a black cat who was the pet of a monk at a monastery. The monk would tie the cat up during meditation. The monk passed the cat on to the next kid and the next kid – and eventually the cat died…so they went and got another black cat to tie up during meditation. The point here is that this was once something that was functionally useful but had turned into something totally useless. He equates this stories to the discrimination and inequalities found in so many religions. He says these inequalities in our holy texts were functionally useful for the old societies, but today they are useless because we have changed.

2. He argued that we need to move away from fear and guilt in religion. Children can’t be forced to wear a veil, a turban or to not cut their hair. The children need to want to do it, and to love to do it. Instead of using the religion as a way of making a child scared, we need to teach religion and faith to the next generation as something to embrace and to love because faith should grow from the heart.

Right now we are collectively keeping out the love.

There you have it!

I agreed with a lot that was said and disagreed the most with the atheist. :) The only guy that offered some real concrete advice for keeping faith alive was Kulvir Gill from Sikhism. I think his two ideas are good, but they are certainly not the whole picture. A lot needs to be done to keep faith alive. People need to faithful and hopeful of a lot of things in the future in order to live productive lives. I think if you all lose faith in religion, love, humanity – whatever our “thing” is then there are going to be a lot of depressed people out there. We all need something to hold onto, and I think it is up to each of us to learn to work together and to teach the next generation to stay positive and put their talents to work.