Bishop Elected in Episcopal Church Holds Buddhist Ordination

Institute on Religion & Democracy ^ | February 23, 2009 | Jeff Walton

[PAR35]

Latest from the ECUSA.

[PAR35]

Buddhiscipalian ping.

[Pete from Shawnee Mission]

Let’s see... is that “No man can serve two masters..’’; or “What is the sound of one hand clapping?”

[TaoOfSteve]

Buddhism, contrary to popular belief, is not a religion. In fact, Buddha specifically excluded any knowledge of Deity or afterlife from his sphere.

It's just a groovy philosophy and set of emotional exercises. By definition, if understood an practiced correctly, it *can't* conflict with any theology (except perhaps one that demands concentration on desire).

[The_Reader_David]

This reminds me of two amusing stories, one true, the other a joke:

There was an occasion when Fr. Alexander Schmemann, the noted Orthodox theologian, was walking through the Cathedral of St. John the Divine in the company of an Anglo-Catholic clergyman (back before all the Anglo-Catholics decamped to the ‘Continuing Anglican churches’, or swam the Bosphorus or the Tiber). In one of the niches off the side aisle of the nave, they came upon a statue of the Buddha. Fr. Alexander in his rolling Russian baritone, declared, “Do you know what this is? This is bullsh*t!”

There is also the joke about the old Episcopalian traditionalist (it doesn’t matter if it’s an Anglo-Catholic or a Prayer-Book Society Type), who turns to his wife in the pew as a statue of the Buddha is processed through the church, and says, “So help me, one more think like this, and I’m out of here!”.

[OneVike]

Little children, it is the last hour; and as you have heard that the Antichrist is coming, even now many antichrists have come, by which we know that it is the last hour. They went out from us, but they were not of us; for if they had been of us, they would have continued with us; but they went out that they might be made manifest, that none of them were of us. (1John 2:18-19)

There will be many to accompany this gentleman while he burns in hell for eternity along with his father Satn.

[padre35]

That is what I had read as well, Buddhism in a way is no different from practicing The Power of Positive Thinking.

And how can a Buddhist become “ordained”?

[Porterville]

What is up with this spastic yellow journalism that is trying to get people fired up about nothing. Buddhism is by in large a philosophy in most of the world; and a very good one at that.

[Porterville]

“There will be many to accompany this gentleman while he burns in hell for eternity along with his father Satn.”

You’re a very odd duck, and Satn is not how you spell the devil’s name. You are hateful and wrong... wrong... wrong ... wrong.

[TaoOfSteve]

That is what I had read as well, Buddhism in a way is no different from practicing The Power of Positive Thinking. And how can a Buddhist become “ordained”?

For every disciple in search of authority, there is someone willing to sell it to him.

[OneVike]

Yeah I know, and I'll go to the back of the class as wait until everyone has left.

Then I will write on the board 1000 time satan, satan, satan, satan, satan. Then I will write on another board why I feel guilty for not liking the poor chap, who will burn in hell someday.

[OneVike]

If he doesn’t repent that is. The Bishop, not his father the devil.

[Knitting A Conundrum]

It counts which sect you belong to...it may not be theistically oriented, but a lot of Buddhism as practiced and believed is more than just a philosophy....and has a wide mix of saints (such as Avalokitesvara, who becomes Kuan Yin or Kannon, and is a major figure in Mahayana Buddhism), deities who are seen as buddhists (Such as the adaptation of Sarasvati, who ends up in Japan as Benzaiten) and ritual practices, including a variety of rituals for the dead, including funeral rites and pious practices such as feeding the hungry ghosts. Most of the Buddhist scriptures mention a whole range of gods and demons, too, btw...And we won't even get into the importance of Amitābha and his Pure Land, where people hope to be reborn, and whose very name is the mantra by which even the most wicked soul can get a shot at his paradise. Not appropriate for a Christian Bishop to have ordination in.

[JSDude1]

Can we just Officially finally stop calling Episcopalians ‘Christians’?

[Arguendo]

You really think this guy is a true Christian? It seems unlikely, to say the least.

[PAR35]

it *can't* conflict with any theology (except perhaps one that demands concentration on desire).

Such as Christianity? http://www.desiringgod.org/

[PAR35]

Buddhism in a way is no different from practicing The Power of Positive Thinking.

Which is also contrary to Christianity.

[PAR35]

There are probably still some who are. The Bishop over in South Carolina, for example.

[stripes1776]

It's just a groovy philosophy and set of emotional exercises. By definition, if understood an practiced correctly, it *can't* conflict with any theology (except perhaps one that demands concentration on desire).

Then that makes Buddishm incompatible with Christianity. At the heart of Christianity lies the greatest desire of all, the desire for God. And this desire requires the greatest concentration. That concentration is the purpose of Lent, the liturgical season that western Christians begin tomorrow.

A person is perfectly entitled to be a Buddhist if he so chooses. But what he cannot pretend, without engaging in a great illusion, that Buddhism is compatible with Christianity. Buddhists and Christians may live in peace with one another, but they can never live in the same world.

[SunkenCiv]

In 2004, Pennsylvania priest Bill Melnyk was revealed to be a druid; while in 2007 Seattle priest Ann Holmes Redding declared that she was simultaneously an Episcopalian and a Muslim.

That's fitting, it's simultaneously a church and not.