Us vs. Them

I have been finding it difficult to respond in a skillful and compassionate way to many of the recent attacks, mostly coming from the right wing of American politics, both in public and made against me personally in response to some of my posts.

As examples:

• Elizabeth Dole runs an ad in her senate campaign accusing her opponent of being in league with “godless Americans.”
• Senator Kit Bond critiqued Barack Obama because Senator Obama wants to appoint judges who “have a heart, have an empathy [sic] for the teenage mom, the minority, the gay, the disabled. We want them to show empathy. We want them to show compassion.” http://www.cbsnews.com/blogs/2008/10/30/politics/fromtheroad/entry4558204.shtml?tag=rightRail;rightRailInner
• Sarah Palin has begun to attack Barack Obama because he attended a party for a fellow faculty member at the University of Chicago who happened to be Palestinian and disagrees with the unconditional support offered to Israel by the United States.
• “Joe the Plumber” claims, effectively, that Barack Obama has more volunteers because liberals do not work as hard as conservatives and therefore have more time on their hands.
• Keith Olberman nominates a “Worst Person in the World” prize every night on his news show.


My reaction to all of the above, as well as numerous other examples of the “us vs. them” line of attack is disgust. Indeed, I have such a strong reaction that I must limit my intake of the news lest my anger boil over and I say things I will later regret.

Of course, I think my reaction is natural, because all of these statements define me as one of “them” – the other to be feared. As a Buddhist who does not accept the idea of a God, I am certainly “godless.”

As a person who worked for years in the criminal justice system, I certainly think judges should be compassionate within the bounds of the law. After all, if the law were mechanical we would put automatons on the bench rather then attempt to put our best legal minds there.

I certainly disagree with unconditional support of Israel and think that we should be doing far more to help Palestinian moderates. In point of fact, I find the McCain’s campaign of disparagement of anyone who happens to be an Arab American and associated with Barack Obama to be racist.

Finally, the only reason I have not done more to work for Senator Obama and Mark Udall (running for senate in my home state of Colorado) is the amount of time I must devote to my job.

I pay my taxes, keep my front lawn in reasonable shape, and do my best to raise my son to be the best person he can be. So what makes me scary?

On the other side of the political spectrum, I am sure Mr. Olberman alienates anyone who happens to agree with that evenings “worst person” nominee.

We can see the spiral of fear to anger to hate escalating here. The saying of the Buddha, “hatred does not cease through hatred at any time. Hatred ceases through love. This is an unalterable law.” Has many counterparts in the Abrahamic faiths, yet we never seem to learn this lesson.

Our greatest leaders have never appealed to our fear and hate; they have appealed to our better natures.

FDR’s stirring “We have nothing to fear but fear itself.”

Abraham Lincoln said “I destroy my enemies when I make them my friends.” and at the close of the long bitter Civil War,

“With malice toward none, with charity for all, with firmness in the right as God gives us to see the right, let us strive on to finish the work we are in, to bind up the nation's wounds, to care for him who shall have borne the battle and for his widow and his orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a just and lasting peace among ourselves and with all nations.”

I truly despair for my country when we do not seem to hold charity to be a civic and social virtue, not just an individual virtue; when we engage in fear mongering solely to gain power. We must see that we are all interconnected and that the suffering of any one person leads to the suffering of us all. A foreclosure on someone else’s home drives down the value of mine; the failure to provide universal health insurance drives up my costs; the failure to provide decent food housing, education and jobs with a living wage drives up crime. Yet, our political leaders, when given a choice between stepping out into a new day, or withdrawing into a locked and dark room, huddling in fear, they choose the later.

We need to show the courage and hope that we will step out into the sunshine of a new day. Sure there may be rain or snow, but to stay huddled in the darkness is the path of misery and suffering screaming at each other because not stepping out is obviously the fault of “them.”

If we reject our fear we can move forward and move on beyond fear, to a bigger, greater compassionate nation.

Does science make belief in God obsolete?

There is a fascinating discussion on http://www.templeton.org/belief/ - Does science make belief in God obsolete?

I found myself most in agreement with the article by Stuart Kaufman, of the University of Calgary. He discussed “reinventing the sacred”, which I think is what I am attempting here.

On the attraction to Buddhism

On the attraction to Buddhism

As a history geek, I was not aware of any attempt, ever, to spread Buddhism by force. I am also not aware of any significant attempts to enforce Buddhist “orthodoxy” by force.

Imagine, for example, an “enlightenment crusade”

“Accept the 8 fold path to end the cycle of death and rebirth or die and… be reborn!

Does not make much sense I think.

Imagine a Zen inquisition – saffron robed monks standing over a torture victim stretched on a rack screaming

“WHAT IS THE SOUND OF ONE HAND CLAPPING?”

“It is NOT NOTHING! Get Dick Cheney and we’ll water-board him!”

Somehow, I do not see that.

Am I a Christian?

Am I a Christian?
In an attempt to review why I am rejecting Christianity and considering a conversion to Buddhism, the need to get my own thoughts in order and a decent respect for the opinion of others who care for me requires that I set forth the reasoning. It would not be well to start my voyage on the great vehicle with an unskillful act.

For background it might be helpful if one is familiar with these books, as these started my thoughts moving in this direction:

Joseph Campbell and Bill Moyers: Joseph Campbell and the Power of Myth

Carl Sagan and Ann Druyan: The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God


Thomas Merton: Zen and the Birds of Appetite

Thomas Merton: New Seeds of Contemplation

His Holiness the Dali Lama: The Art of Happiness: A Handbook for Living

Thich Nhat Hanh: Anger

Thich Nhat Hanh: Living Buddha, Living Christ

Terry Pratchett: Small Gods

Monty Python: The Insignificance Song

I have also listened to a number of talks by Mr. Campbell.


This journey started with a point made by Joseph Campbell. To paraphrase, he pointed to a basic difference between Christianity and Eastern religions. In the Buddhist and Hindu traditions, we all have divinity within us. In that sense, we are all children of God – it would be our Buddha nature. In Christian traditions, there is one and only one child of God, Jesus of Nazareth.

I did not believe in one and only one child of God, but, as Mr. Campbell pointed out, that only made me a heretic, not a non-believer. I began to think of Jesus as a Bodhisattva and therefore human.

I also gave thought to the Trinity. I have never accepted the idea of a triune God. I thought of the Trinity as a construct, similar to the constructs I used on a regular basis in the study of subjects like quantum mechanics or advanced mathematics. It was a model to allow finite humans to understand the infinite, in the same way that probability electron clouds were a construct for understanding quantum states of electrons.

A series of experiences then intruded to cement my rejection of Christianity.

First, I worked at Compassion International. They are a wonderful group of people doing great work to alleviate child poverty. They are sincere. They practice what they preach for the most part. I now support and will continue to support a child through their programs. However, I heard a number of people who called themselves Christian were simply very small in their thinking. They are biblical literalists, who thought the earth 6,000 years old. They had no concept of the infinite (or close to) nature of the universe, space and time. They rejected all scientific understanding of the world where it conflicted with a literal reading of the Bible. They routinely invoked God’s will or divine intervention in the most random of acts. They believed that only those who think as they do would be saved. In short, they worshipped a small god bound to the earth, not the creator of the universe in all its grandeur. Instead, they truly believed that all truth concerning biology, physics, geology and chemistry were revealed to bronze age sheppards in the near east. I was truly turned off by the displays of staggering ignorance I heard there.

Second, I read Carl Sagan’s book. He put forth a simple question. To paraphrase, it was “In your experience, does God suspend the laws of nature to perform miracles, or do people lie or misinterpret experiences?” In truth, my experience is the later.

Third, I rejected the dual nature inherent in the Abrahamic faiths. I did not accept the duality of person and spirit, God and nature, form and substance, etc. I know that the denomination I belonged to, the United Church of Christ, did not accept some of the more extreme forms (e.g. transubstantiation) but the duality underlies much of these beliefs.

This Easter, with all my doubts and my increasing lack of faith to hear our minister (a man whom I hold in very high esteem and respect) proclaim “The Lord is risen!” To which we were t respond “The Lord is risen indeed! Alleluia!” I should add he had us doing this in Greek, but I will not attempt to spell that now.

I could not utter the words. I did not believe them to be true. When Jesus died, that was it; he was dead. With the rejection of this central tenet, I realized I was no longer a Christian.