Posted on 01/06/2014 4:32:13 PM PST by markomalley
It didn't take long for the "atheist church" to succumb to in-fighting. It seems they can't even agree on whether to use the word "atheism." From CNN:
The world’s most voguish - though not its only - atheist church opened last year in London, to global attention and abundant acclaim.
So popular was the premise, so bright the promise, that soon the Sunday Assembly was ready to franchise, branching out into cities such as New York, Dublin and Melbourne.
“It’s a way to scale goodness,” declared Sanderson Jones, a standup comic and co-founder of The Sunday Assembly, which calls itself a “godless congregation.”
But nearly as quickly as the Assembly spread, it split, with New York City emerging as organized atheism’s Avignon.
In October, three former members of Sunday Assembly NYC announced the formation of a breakaway group called Godless Revival.
(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...
Is it okay to laugh at the irony?
Is this satire?
Buddhists have been in operation for a long time.
They are essentially an atheist church.
They are not an anti-theist church.
The Buddha is reputed to have said “The things of G-d are unknown, and unknowable, so why argue?”
There will soon be Eastern Orthodox Atheists and Protestant Atheists
“I don’t believe in God more than you”
“Oh yeah? You just capitalized God, you Bible thumper!”
“Oh, it’s on!”
OK.. so then what the bleeding crap is the point of Buddhism?
LOL!
Church of the Utterly Unredeemable
The point is to help sentient beings avoid suffering.
:)
lol
Believing in God is not suffering
I am happy for you.
Wouldn’t it be simpler for them to just join the CoE?
The Church of the Most Holy Unbeliever.
Buddha, Sidhartha Gautama, himself kept denying his divinity but that was ignored.
A "church" is God's house so "Buddha" and "church" haven't anything to do with each other.
But I like your quote from him. There was no writing at the time of Buddha, so ALL his sayings were from an ORAL tradition. Nothing wrong with that but WRITTEN traditions are often in error so I imagine that many of the Enlightened One's sayings are...non-traditional.
Very good.
Instead of ‘church’ perhaps a better word would be ‘sect’.
There seems to be debate as to whether Buddhism should count as a religion, because religion seems to involve (for some definitions) belief in some superhuman class of beings, or in the case of atheism, non-belief.
Buddhism seeks to avoid the consideration of superhuman beings.
No doubt there are many errors in the teachings, but a lot of Buddhism seems to be created long after Buddha because it works. Northern School practices, such as meditation, perhaps are in this category.
There is a story about an airborne soldier who was really afraid to jump. His sergeant took pity on him, and told him that if his main didn’t open to use his reserve. The soldier was still scared. The Sergeant said, if the reserve doesn’t open, then say “Buddha, Buddha, Buddha”.
The soldier said, “Sergeant, I can’t do that, I am a Baptist!”
The Sergeant said, I told you what to do, so be brave and do as you have been trained.
So the airborne soldier jumped. As luck would have it, his main chute didn’t open. He pulled his reserve, and that cigarette rolled and the ground was coming up very quickly.
The soldier remembered! “Buddha, Buddha, Buddha!” A great hand came out of a cloud and he landed softly on it. He was slowly lowered to the ground. The soldier was greatful but startled. “Jesus Christ!” he exclaimed.
The hand rolled over and slammed him into the ground....
Mrs. Garrison's explanation of evolution is the funniest 60 seconds of television I have ever seen.
That was EXACTLY the problem with Buddhism. It was taken on by others immediately and warped into 10001 different things until it is ALmost gobbly-de-gook.
It really doesn't work as well as the God-faith just because worship HAS to be to a God, not a man, especially a man who was ADAMANT that he was not God or a god.
Talking about meditation in the same breath ALWAYS happens and, really Buddha and meditation have NOTHING to do with each other. Humans have been meditating without a Buddha ever since there have been humans so the two shouldn't be linked at all.
I taught yoga for years and had to quash so many myths and legends about Buddha, Hinduism and meditation. Buddha WAS Indian but the faith NEVER made it in India. The Indians have their own pantheon of gods and goddesses, some human, some animal, some objects and some mixtures of any of those. There are ABOUT 330 MILLION deities in Hinduism. Buddha was only ONE little god...and not the most important one either.
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