I know who I am because I know who I hate – or what’s the point of having religion if you can’t disapprove of other people?

“I say that religion isn’t about believing things. It’s ethical alchemy.

It’s about behaving in a way that changes you, that gives you

intimations of holiness and sacredness.” —Karen Armstrong

 

Bill Moyers on the US PBS has done several interviews with Karen Armstrong.  Here is the beginning of one of them 

Bill Moyers Interviews Karen Armstrong

BILL MOYERS: She was a spark plug in my PBS series on Genesis, her books are best sellers, “The History of God”, “The Battle for God”, “Jerusalem”. She’s written a biography of Buddha, and a short history of Islam. Soon we’ll have her new memoir of her life after the convent where she spent seven years as a nun. Joining me now is one of the world’s foremost students of religion, Karen Armstrong. Thank you.

KAREN ARMSTRONG: Thank you Bill.

BILL MOYERS: If you were God, would you do away with religion?

ARMSTRONG: Well, there are some forms of religion that must make God weep. There are some forms of religion that are bad, just as there’s bad cooking or bad art or bad sex, you have bad religion too. Religion that has concentrated on egotism, that’s concentrated on belligerence rather than compassion.

MOYERS: And so much of religion has been the experience of atrocity.

ARMSTRONG: But then you have to remember that this is what human beings do. Secularism has shown that it can be just as murderous, just as lethal, uh, as religion. Now I think one of the reasons why religion developed in the way that it did over the centuries was precisely to curb this murderous bent that we have as human beings.

MOYERS: You get September 11th … you get the Crusades, you get … do you remember the young Orthodox Jew who assassinated Itzhak Rabin? I can see him right now, looking into the camera, and he says, everything I did, I did for …

ARMSTRONG: For God.

MOYERS: … for the glory of God.

ARMSTRONG: Yes. Yes. Well, this is … this is bad religion. Compassion is not a popular virtue. Very often when I talk to religious people, and mention how important it is that compassion is the key, that it’s the sine-qua-non of religion, people look kind of balked, and stubborn sometimes, as much to say, what’s the point of having religion if you can’t disapprove of other people? And sometimes we use religion just to back up these unworthy hatreds, because we’re frightened too.

MOYERS: Fear?

ARMSTRONG: There’s great fear. We fear that if we’re not in control, other people will cut us down to size, and so we hit out first.

From the beginning, violence was associated with religion, but the advanced religions, and I’m talking about Buddhism, Hinduism, monotheism, the Hebrew prophets, they insisted that you must transcend this violence, you must not give in to this violence, but you must learn to recognize that every single other human being is sacred.

 

To read the interview go HERE

To read other interviews Bill Moyers has had with Karen Armstrong go HERE

Re Gaza: “Certitude divides and diversity unifies…..We have to elevate religion above politics…..” Amen.

 

“Certitude divides and diversity unifies…..We have to elevate religion above politics…..” H.R.H. Prince El-Hassan Bin Talal of Jordan BBC Newsnight 9th Feb 2006. Photo source: BBC

 Juxtapositioning creates new contexts.  Words and images are one such juxtapositioning.

I have suggested that the Finnish artist photographer Silomaki has shown new ways.

The images of the suffering of the people Gaza are currently relentless, none worse than those of parents carrying dead or  injured children.

These words came to mind – those of H.R.H. Prince El-Hassan Bin Talal of Jordan on BBC Newsnight, 9th Feb 2006, “Certitude divides and diversity unifies…..We have to elevate religion above politics…..”

The image is one of a multitude. The words are rare wisdom.

When the rockets and shells fire no more how shall we live that wisdom?  

Lead us Oh God to the ways and means!

Of seahorses and vilification; the story of the pregnant man and his wife

 

You can still see the touching story about Beatie on Channel4 HERE

Beatie’s original story is HERE

All major newspapers have views on the story.

If you search more widely the stunning experience, as with other stories, is the depth of the vile responses – it is a wonder to behold.

The video speaks of family, love and compassion.

A more compassionate response, linked to sexuality studies is HERE

New slant on having, knowing, being and doing

It’s always great when a new idea bursts in your mind – or simply a new slant that puts in focused place long-held but vaguer ideas.

 

This for me was such an idea;

 

‘What you do is what you you’ve got’.

 

It came from here;

 

 

 

With Eckhart Tolle however I would say that having, knowing, being and doing have more than complex interactions, they have the context of silence – from which their truths arise.

 

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True achievement, success and happiness lie in being fully and positively human -

through our caring our creativity and our criticality –

developed via service to the communities to which we belong.

All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

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On this site there are 1000+ ideas that you can put to work straight away.

“Why not use the SEARCH, CATGORIES or INDEX to find the ideas for you?”

What’s the difference between spirituality and religion?

What's the difference between spirituality and religion?

.

How do you answer the question above?

Below is how far I have got with this issue.

Spirituality is how we relate to the unknown and unknowable – to Ultimate reality – and the meaning and motivation we derive therefrom.

Our worldview, as a consequence, is how we ‘read’ the world. Our worldview includes that of which are conscious, plus that which derives from enculturation.  Becoming more fully conscious of Oneness, and acting accordingly, is our purpose.

Religion is the agreed set of relationships, teachings and customs held in common with any religious group of which one has membership.

Progress in spirituality is measured by regularly bringing oneself to account – in relation to the standards of your spirituality, world-view and religious group/s (if any).

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Etymological issues:

The English word “religion” is derived from the Middle English “religioun” which came from the Old French “religion.” It may have been originally derived from the Latin word “religo” which means “good faith,” “ritual,” and other similar meanings. Or it may have come from the Latin “religãre” which means “to tie fast.”

Doing your own research:

A very good starting point is provided by the Ontario Consultants on Religious Tolerance.  See HERE

The definitions I like best from this source are;

George Hegel: “the knowledge possessed by the finite mind of its nature as absolute mind.”

Paul Tillich: “Religious is the state of being grasped by an ultimate concern”

Others are;

The Religious Tolerance group tell us that David Carpenter has collected and published a list of definitions of religion, including:

Anthony Wallace: “a set of rituals, rationalized by myth, which mobilizes supernatural powers for the purpose of achieving or preventing transformations of state in man or nature.”

Hall, Pilgrim, and Cavanagh: “Religion is the varied, symbolic expression of, and appropriate response to that which people deliberately affirm as being of unrestricted value for them.”

Karl Marx: “Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.”

Don Swenson defines religion in terms of the sacred: “Religion is the individual and social experience of the sacred that is manifested in mythologies, ritual, ethos, and integrated into a collective or organization.”

Paul Connelly also defines religion in terms of the sacred and the spiritual: “Religion originates in an attempt to represent and order beliefs, feelings, imaginings and actions that arise in response to direct experience of  the sacred and the spiritual. As this attempt expands in its formulation and elaboration, it becomes a process that creates meaning for itself on a sustaining basis, in terms of both its originating experiences and its own continuing responses.”

He defines sacred as: “The sacred is a mysterious manifestation of power and presence that is experienced as both primordial & transformative, inspiring awe & rapt attention. This is usually an event that represents a break or discontinuity from the ordinary, forcing a re-establishment or recalibration of perspective on the part of the experiencer, but it may also be something seemingly ordinary, repeated exposure to which gradually produces a perception of mysteriously cumulative significance out of proportion to the significance originally invested in it.”

He further defines the spiritual as: “The spiritual is a perception of the commonality of mindfulness in the world that shifts the boundaries between self and other, producing a sense of the union of purposes of self and other in confronting the existential questions of life, and providing a mediation of the challenge-response interaction between self and other, one and many, that underlies existential questions.”

My final question – “Why are there so many religious intolerance groups?”

To read the full article by the Religious Tolerance group go HERE

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True achievement, success and happiness lie in being fully and positively human –

through our caring our creativity and our criticality –

developed via service to the communities to which we belong.

-0-

All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

An open letter to all who recognize Oneness

 

Dear Fellow Travellers

 

1) Like your lives my life, (in a modest way), has (for the last 45 years), been dedicated to;

 

‘the advancement of education in the consideration of the basic unity of all religions, in particular by the provision of courses to provide an understanding of the relationship of man to the universe, the earth, the environment and the society he lives in, to Reality and to God.’

 

and right now the global and local opportunities, and dangers, strike me as unparalleled.

 

2) The great challenge seems to me to concern ‘the how’ of getting wider acceptance of Oneness and oneness as in Perennial Philosophy and the The Golden Rule – raised consciousness that will positively affect decision-making in all of the vital arenas of human concern.

 

3) A great shift in consciousness is taking place.

 

The great shift in consciousness is evidenced by two events.

Firstly in just the last few years what was esoteric is now open and freely available to to all.

 

Secondly millions are responding – in some way shape or form.

 

I have in mind especially the work of Ken Wilber, Karen Armstrong and most recently Eckhart Tolle.

 

Tolle’s writing is highly accessible – in the UK most Sun and Daily Mirror readers could handle it.

 

Of course functional literacy and level of consciousness and not directly correlated! But eleven million had by Week 3 tuned in to Tolle’s course run by Oprah Winfrey – see HERE

 

….. Oprah went further with Eckhart Tolle than she has ever gone with a previous author picked for her book club. She chose to present, with Tolle, a 10-week series of “webinars” – online seminars – with one chapter of the book (which she puts on the bedside table of all of her guest rooms) discussed each week. In the first webinar, transmitted on 3 March, Tolle led Winfrey and the millions of viewers who logged on in several different countries in silent meditation; viewers were then encouraged to submit questions to Tolle via Skype. By the third week, 11 million people were logging on.

 

This surely has no parallel in the whole of humankind’s spiritual history. The course is HERE

 

Not only are ‘the books open’ but there is more than Maslow’s 2% willing a new earth.

 

The question is how can their energy be harnessed and focused for the common good – or do we have to wait until the first nuclear war, simply because those who ‘know’ can’t find ways and means to influence those who actually ‘do the doing’ and make our world as it is.

 

4) We need to be thinking ‘outside of the box’. The old ways may not be sufficient. Keeping the candles of light and hope and truth is something that the precious few have done down through the ages, but now the challenge is to shift up to a larger stage.

 

For example inter-faith dialogue may well be effete (and for some cunning PR) compared to the people who really operate at the ‘hot interfaces’ – e. g. diplomats and business-people.

 

5) Absorbing and responding to this fact seems to me to be the challenge that might bring forth balm for suffering being borne by untold millions.

 

A sufficient proportion of America has said ‘Yes we can’ but even more critical than the decisions Obama will be making over the next 4 or 8 years is how can the light of Oneness be brought into the darkened hearts of religious haters and racists. That Oneness is the Tipping Point. The

‘tipping-point’ is realization of that Oneness – and it needs more than abstract assent.

 

6) My personal experience has led me to realize that individuals need something real and living and breathing through which to connect with ‘foreign’ wisdom traditions.

 

I believed in the oneness of religions long before I came across

a) Jane Clark’s article on Ibn al-Arabi – which created for me a living connection to Islam – and

b) the Bhagavad Gita Chanted in English HERE using a text of the Bhagavad Gita in English HERE

NB Try listening to the chanting whilst reading the text – wonderful! – transporting!

These gave me a living connection to Hinduism.

 

7) Starting points:

 

Perhaps looking very closely and deeply at ‘reverse fundamentalism’ is the way to generate programmes of positive action.

 

Karen Armstrong as you probably know is being given the opportunity to raise up the principle of the Golden Rule via her ‘Charter for Compassion’ campaign see HERE

 

Perhaps making celebratory programmes free to all on the internet…..

 

Perhaps Golden Rule materials free online for Heads and school…….

 

Perennial philosophy and the ‘federal’ Golden Rule – the ‘world language’ to be taught, in addition to their own religions, so that all can communicate with those of other faiths ……

 

What do you think?

 

We who have striven to keep the candles alight have to contribute to ways and means of reaching a sufficiently wider audience to get established some of the foundations for a new earth.

 

All blessings on the further development of your work.

 

Roger

Ten ways to bridge and transcend racial and religious hatred

 

 

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The campaign Charter for Compassion are asking for contributions for the final charter.  Here is my first draft contribution;

Compassion and Peace: ten ways to bridge and transcend racial and religious hatred

 

1 See the Golden Rule as the equivalent to a language in addition to your own – “My ‘mother tongue’ is Islam/Christianity/Buddhism etc but I also speak ‘the Golden Rule’ – so that I can be a sister/brother to peoples of all religions and none.

 

2 Implore people like Barack Obama to spend money on deepening cultural understanding – say 10% of the military budget switched to Arabic/Islamic, Chinese and Russian studies. Generate an ‘open data-base’ of experience learned.

 

3 Encourage all countries to massively increase exchange programmes.  Send everyone with a ‘We’ve got these problems how are my host country dealing with them’ pack – and require a thorrough de-briefing upon return to home country – we must see that the most important problems are held in common, and that we must pool answers.

 

4 Use the knowledge as a data-base for university and school respect for other cultures courses – instead of allowing our societies to continue falsely claiming that the mad fundamentalist minority = the reality of the whole communuity.

 

5 Get celebrity goodwill ambassadors for the GR – include business people , they have more interchange with ‘foreigners’ than any other group.  Get pop groups talking and singing about it.

 

Get Barack Obama talking about it – and Nels Mandela, and Archbishop Tutu etc.

 

6 Start teaching the Golden Rule – one school at a time – everywhere.

 

7 Generate badges, widgets and bling for websites, windows, clothing that conveys messages such as – ‘I speak oneness and diversity’. ‘We support the GR’, etc (Get some adverstising agencies working on it).

 

8 Support studies of fundamentalism – focus on ways and means antidotes and prophylactics.  The best writers on fundamentalism may not be in obvious academic fields – the best I have found is 

 

9 Look for ‘out of the box’ solutions such as brilliant comedians such as Omid Djalili and Shazia Mirza.

If you don’t like strong comedy don’t go – but I suspect that Omid, and the others have ‘lanced more religious boils’ for the general population than all of the politicians and academics put put together!

 

10 Support ways and means for deeper applications of the Golden Rule – we need courses from nursery to university epecially based on the brilliant writings and work of a) Eckhart Tolle, b) Ken Wilber and c) Karen Armstrong.

Eckhart Tolle article HERE

Is Eckhart Tolle the new Freud? – and what about ‘Applied Tolle’

I think that Eckhart Tolle is a great spiritual teacher.

Following Oprah putting up on her website his New Earth  as a free online course – see HERE – Tolle has reached millions.

In writing about him and his teachings my purpose is not to do anything but appreciate and applaud him – and suggest that a few ‘tweaks’ might make his teaching accessible and palatable to even more people.

Why?

Well his ‘experience’ and his life-time of ‘wrestling’ with that experience culminating in his 3 key books, audio talks and the Oprah course give us a whole range of insights – enough to change the world if they get taken up by enough people – but you must admit it has been a very un-typical life. And does that un-typical life restrict at all the take-up of his insights?

What, for example, would be different if he had spent those 30 years raising children or working in schools helping raise other people’s children? The emphases, the suppositions, the challenges in and from his teaching would be different. If you are a 35year old dad or mum with partner, 3 kids, and an uncertain future, the issues and their management are bound to be different.

He is compassionate and empathetic but I fear that the same criticism will be leveled against him as was leveled against Freud i.e. that he generalized on too narrow an ‘experience base’

Most people don’t get to spend 30 years processing their stuff, including 4 year-long episodes of sitting on a park bench. Many people from enduring commitments are lucky to find 40secs. I know the world is insane, but kids have to fed and chauffeured, and guided , and…….

A harsh critic (not me) might say, “Freud generalized from experience largely confined to neurotic, middle-class Austrian women, and Tolle generalizes from a life of solitary, self-indulgent, self-obsession.”

His style does come down on the side I am talking about – compassion for ordinary people who are struggling to do their best in situations that they can’t walk away from – but I suspect that an even wider sphere of influence is needed than his present ‘constituency’. The breadth of constituency is also connected to another issue and that is the need for ‘applied Tolle’.

We need his wisdom to be as accessible and palatable right now.

The applied Tolle will take a little longer – but we can’t wait for a generation of PhDs, and PhDs have an average readership of 1.7 people!

We do however need right now the beginnings of Tolle applied to a whole range of areas including education, psychology, inter-faith understanding, therapies, politics.

Chanting, meditation and oneness: Aum, the sacred Indian mantra

Katinka Hesselink has brought together a range of videos and other stuff to do with ‘Aum’ – very useful despite the Squidoo tacky-fication.

via Aum, the sacred Indian mantra ; Om, Ohm – meditating unity

Squidoo also do pages of widely varying quality on luminaries, and others, e.g.

Karen Armstrong

Size Doesn’t Matter – a film by Nic Askew

This is one of many films by Nic Askew.

Watch all Nic’s films – my guess is his work will fire a revolution in video on the web. He has shown us how to do ‘deep and fun’, ‘word-and-image’ videos in 2 or a few minutes. He has to lie somewhere between inspiring and genius – time will tell!

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

SEE also Learning Motivation for Success

Art, Nature and realizing our own Beauty

To look upon beauty, in art or in nature, is to realize our own beauty.

Photo source

The relative context of perspective – or new perspective from re-contextualizing?

Art teaches. Nature teaches.

Buddhism is compassion. When we realize our own beauty the boundaries of our compassion expand.

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All postings to this site relate to the central model in the

PhD. Summaries are HERE

SEE also Learning Motivation for Success

Compassion is love shaped into an embrace.