[dead]

All I Really Need to Know I Learned in Kindergarten at the Buddhist Temple.

[Paul Atreides]

No wonder Richard Gere loves him. Any time Gere veers off a script, he descends into incoherent babbling.

[End Times Sentinel]

Your typical Western “Buddhist” (read: liberal with empty spiritual life) reminds me a lot of the typical American “muslim” (read: inmate). Both seem to be drawn to the religion because of it’s fashionable trappings- “buddhists" get to meditate in inappropriate places and speak in pedantic platitudes; muslims get to assume a cool new name and get a goofy hat. Neither of them seem to regard anything beyond the most basic understanding of the religion as necessary.

It’s a sad cry for attention which is generally heard by others to mean “I’m an idiot.”

Owl_Eagle

”Guns Before Butter.”

[Prodigal Daughter]

And yet Western culture stands for just about everything a Buddhist is supposed to renounce.

And if you read Freedom in Exile, he does renounce us.

[B Knotts]

Algore getting in touch with his "innate spiritual nature."

[avg_freeper]

This is nothing! You should try to caddy for him:

So I jump ship in Hong Kong and make my way over to Tibet, and I get on as a looper at a course over in the Himalayas. A looper, you know, a caddy, a looper, a jock. So, I tell them I'm a pro jock, and who do you think they give me? The Dalai Lama, himself.

Twelfth son of the Lama. The flowing robes, the grace, bald... striking. So, I'm on the first tee with him. I give him the driver. He hauls off and whacks one---big hitter, the Lama---long, into a ten-thousand foot crevasse, right at the base of this glacier. Do you know what the Lama says?

"Gunga galunga... gunga, gunga-galunga".

So we finish the eighteenth and he's gonna stiff me. And I say, "Hey, Lama, hey, how about a little something, you know, for the effort, you know." And he says, "Oh, uh, there won't be any money, but when you die, on your deathbed, you will receive total consiousness."

So I got that goin' for me, which is nice.

[Billthedrill]

Well, on the one hand you'll find relatively few Buddhists flying airliners into occupied buildings, but I've always felt that there's something lacking in image in a religion of passivity and contemplation, a certain vigor, a certain elan, that could be relatively easily addressed by a Torquemada in a saffron robe. One thing about it - no one expects a Buddhist Inquisition!

[Dasaji]

I am not sure what the intent is in the posting of this article on Free Republic. (and the ensuing responses that seem to bring the name Richard Gere into it...One man is not representative of a religion because of his choice of that religion - otherwise the name Jim Baker - and Tammy Fae - could make Christianity sound like a farce as well.)

Sometimes wisdom and enlightenment are as simple as the words spoken by a child. Because they are spoken by the Dalai Lama, this journalist decides to slam him. Sounds to me like he is stuck in Judgment, is clueless about Enlightenment and should probably stick to writing about subjects of which he is aware and knowledgeable. (Like the Simpsons.)

[mutchdutch]

When I was in Mongolia, my interpreter said buddism was picked by the leaders to placate a very warlike society........ seems to work????? They were rediscovering their buddism and ghengis kahn after 70 years of communist rule in which the communist tried to destory both........ wonder which will float to the top?????

[Fedupwithit]

"he's a big hitter, the Lama..."

: )

[Savage Beast]

One cannot know from reading this whether Chris McGillion is incapable of understanding what the Dalai Lama is saying or whether he just hasn't made the effort. Everything he has attributed to the Dalai Lama makes a lot more sense than anything McGillion himself has said. Either he's dumb, or he doesn't want to understand.

[N. Theknow]

The Dalai Lama seeks to excite the "innate spiritual nature" of people so that they might choose kindness and affection in their relations to others rather than anger, hatred or the temptation to exploit.

I love you,
You love me,
We're a happy family...

[colorado tanker]

"Don't give in to hate - that leads to the dark side."

[LarryLied]

when religion is leeched in this fashion of too much content, all that is left is platitudes - or worse, banalities.

This is like judging the Catholic Church on a few speech by the Pope. The writer has no knowledge of Tibetan Buddhism at all.

[Revolting cat!]

Very insightful and provocative article. You can see by some of the responses here why such articles could not be written and published in this country. Why, that would be Hate Speech itself! Don't we here in post-modern America love platitudes, banalities and comfy cliches to go along with inoffensive fast food and watery tasteles beer?!

[Aquinasfan]

Like abortion, he said through an interpreter (thus choosing his words carefully), "these are very complex issues on which it is very difficult to make generalised statements because the individuality of each context would be so different that it is something that needs to be judged - the merits of its decision - based upon context by context".

Bleah.

The Hindu/ Buddhist pantheistic mist evaporates under a couple of internal contradictions:

• If truth is oneness and "the word of truth is One and the word of two is error," then "true" and "false" cannot exist. Yet this statement is a truth claim.

• If the world is "Maya" (illusion) and everything is really One, then where did the illusion come from? Is there really an illusion and a hidden reality or is everything One?

[Bush or Bust]

ping

[FreeTheHostages]

The Dalai Lama is a great man who has struggled brilliantly in the only way his unarmed people can against brutal Chinese occupation and mass murder. He and his people face the sword of communism every day. Yes, his religion is not my religion. But he is a great man. Seven Years in Tibet. Worth reading. Tens of thousands of Tibetan monks killed by the Chinese Communists, almost silently. Worth remembering. The Dali Lama's many sacrifices in his people's struggle against communism. Worth respecting.

Of all the things!! Are we going to attack Solzhenitzn next for character flaws? Oh right, some people are already off and doing that. These are great men who have fought great battles. They may say things you disagree with. Comparing the Dali Lama to Lisa Simpson is just incomprehensibly silly.

[Bush or Bust]

The author is not very enlightening either. My understanding is that Buddhists distrust language as a way to enlightenment - preferring meditation and prayer. This doesn't seem wholly incompatible with the Christian way. One also has to wonder why you would attack a dignified and peaceful man instead of the despots who invaded his country.

[Revolting cat!]

Curious, even disturbing, is the way so many non-Buddhist Australians blur the lines between respect, reverence and worship in their attitudes toward the Dalai Lama.

The trouble is that when religion is leeched in this fashion of too much content, all that is left is platitudes - or worse, banalities.

Who was it that said (paraphrasing) 'little minds discuss people, mediocre minds discuss event, great minds discuss ideas'? We can only aspire, of course, but we're not aspiring at the moment, it seems to me. The article is about ideas, however trivial, which is why I find it interesting, not about who the celebrity from the pages of People magazine named Dalai Lama is, or what Kennedy did or didn't do to Tibet. And the idea this article begins to explore is the coctail party fascination of the Western bourgeoise with some exotic religions that may or may not be relevant to the Western way of life.

So, since we're all so disappointed with the way this thread has proceeded, this is my own private disappointment. Oh, well, I'll just go back to that Entertainment Tonight website that I discovered by seeing the list of websites visited by a missing intern who had a master's degree in something or other. Like heavy, man!

[Kevin Curry]

Christian church leaders promote the same message, but when they do they tend to be ignored or scorned, whereas the Dalai Lama is regarded as a welcome breath of fresh air.

That's because the Dillweed Llama pleases the ruling power of this dispensation. Of course the world is going to "ooh" and aah" over his every fatuous utterence.

Jesus Christ was rejected in favor of a common criminal, scourged, spat upon, and nailed to a tree. He did not spend his days jet-setting, luxuriating in opulent splendor, and wining and dining with and being praised by the Herods and Salomes of his age.

The ruling power of this dispensation was not nearly as pleased with Jesus Christ; nor is he pleased with Jesus Christ's faithful followers.