Or rather, Buddhists of the cult of the Dalai Lama.

I came for the Colbert to get all up in my faith. He didn't get all up in my faith - just buddhists'. Bah.

I am so happy you thought of me and said hello. I was thinking of you, too.

I lost my little doggie, Tess, about two weeks ago, and it really sucked the wind out of my sails. She started breathing funny on Wednesday, and she was dead Thursday night. I had to shoot her, because I couldn't stand to watch her suffer. I'll always second guess myself on that, but she was breathing so hard her tongue was turning blue...as if I could have hugged her back to life.

When I pulled the trigger...I realized in the coldest measure of reality...that a chapter of my life had come to an end.

Twelve years, that little shit followed me through thick and thin and I never thought much about it. I loved her, of course, but...now that she's gone...a part of me has died as well.

I'm a bad Buddhist, I guess...this is all chapter and verse....

On the global field, I feel like we have met, or are approaching, the end of an epoch. Out with the olde, in with the new. Kind of hoping it's not WW-III and all...but I can sense a significant change in the works.

I hope you are well, too, and happy, genuinely happy.

This shot of tequila is for you. May you laugh and smile for no reason at all, soon, and for days on end.

This is a very interesting question that I've thought quite a lot about during my life (to myself, not in any sort of professional capacity).

The conclusions that I have come to (so far) are:
I think that, yes, religion in general terms IS a significant (but it is a stretch to say the ONLY) restraint on a pretty large number of people. Which is a prospect that I personally have a negative and pessimistic reaction to, similar to what it sounds like you do.

However, I think that there are lots of mitigating circumstances. First, many different religions currently provide that restraint to people. And in the past, many many more religions provided it to even more people. Many of those different religions have been very very different. Some have been near polar opposites. That proves that if your goal is restraining people from being utterly evil, and someone suggests that religion has made or is making a noble effort towards that (like your uncle), the positive aspects they are cheering for are not unique to any single religion, or dogma, or whatever.

If one accepts that many many diverse and completely different religions can potentially have the positive effects that we're looking for, then the actual source of those effects can not be something specific to any one religion. Instead, it has to be something that is held in common by all such religions.

Religions are so diverse and different, it might be hard to imagine something that they have in common. No specific god is held in common, even though all the Abrahamic religions might arguably share that aspect. Not even the simple idea of a god or gods or creator is far from universal; Buddhists revere no god.

Yet I believe that there is one easily overlooked thing that all religions DO have in common. Humanity. They all come from flawed but usually well-meaning people.

However, atheists hold that humanity in common with religions as well. And that makes me believe that if we understand humanity better, either through psychology, or empathy, or whatever, we can achieve the positive effects of religions without the religions themselves. Certainly without the stone-age dogmatic nonsense -- which tends to have arguably as many if not more BAD effects as good. This actually gives me great hope for humanity; rather the opposite to the conclusion that I came to originally when pondering the question.

There may always be people who have no empathy, and for whom nothing would serve to restrain them from what humanity at large would easily identify as great evil. No religion will handle such individuals any better than no religion ... so I guess I don't lose any sleep over that.

I was just about to say i am willing to believe that he was in for hundreds of years, but the logic used to estimate is anybody's guess and everybody would say different. But then i read on youtube comments that it's meant to be allegorical for some ideal Buddhist length of time at around 10 thousand years, according to the director's commentary.

*dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/jesus-was-a-buddhist-monk-BBC-documentary

3 more comments have been lost in the ether at this killed duplicate.

This video has been declared a duplicate by the original submitter; transferring votes to the original video and killing this dupe - dupeof declared by lucky760.

i knew i posted this!
http://videosift.com/video/jesus-was-a-buddhist-monk-BBC-documentary
mine is dead though.
maybe i could snag yours for a backup?
this is a great doc,though it may make some christians angry but...if the theosophy fits.

Hey Enoch,

No I am getting married soon and I don't think my fiance would appreciate that. As far as posting scripture is concerned, faith comes by hearing and hearing the word of God. You may believe that they are merely words in a book, but the gospel is the power of God unto salvation. I understand where you're coming from Enoch. Sometimes I feel like you are trying to pat me on the head, but it's not that I don't understand your gnostic beliefs. It is that I did understand it, fully embraced them, and rejected it all on the basis of divine revelation. I had gnostic beliefs, mixed with hindu, buddhist and new age ideas, among other things, before I became a Christian. I rejected those beliefs and embraced the word of God as the truth because the Lord directly revealed Himself to me as the Messiah. It wasn't that I read the bible and thought it sounded reasonable, it is because I had direct revelation it is the absolute truth. That's why I am a Christian.

I don't know if you hold the belief that the body is the problem as some gnostics do, but it is sin which is the problem. That is why mankind is separated from God and that is why we need a Savior. Jesus made the way for us to be reborn and be reconciled to God; not as the gnostics teach, that He brought secret knowledge, but that He paid the penalty for sin in our place.

I am from the Republic of Ireland if that's what you mean, although I'll happily drink protestant whiskey (or hindu whiskey or buddhist whiskey or even muslim whiskey if such things existed and tasted good).

And when you grow up learning about your nations struggle to free itself of a foreign monarch, you tend to appreciate the ability to self-govern rather than hand it over to a bunch of corporations.

That said... I am not a "dyed-in-the-wool pro-government statist". I have many issues with many governments. Some are better than others. In some ways, I understand the prevalence of libertarianism in the US, given how particularly messed up your own government is.

So not so much "pro-government" as "anti-libertarian"

In Vancouver BC, Canada's biggest western city, Whites only make up 46.2% (2011)
Total visible minority population is 51.8%
Though I'm sure with the amount of Asian immigrants, this statistic has shifted more so over the 3-4 years since this poll was taken.

Also, 48.8% identify as non-religious while only 36.2% identify as Christian. Next down the line is 5.7% Buddhist & 2.8% Sikh. (for those who are wondering, only 2.2% identify as Muslim.

He's exactly right...

When you read the bible, it's goes from wrath and brimstone to absolute love and forgiveness. Taken as a whole, it's a contradictory mess, which is why there are umpteen different types of christianity each with their own twist.

The KKK, for example, committed terrible crimes based on their interpretation of the bible... Did the bible make them do it, or were they already set on violence and cherry picked the parts of religion that justified it?

And he's right about he Buddhists brutally murdering Rhakines (coincidentally, Muslims) in SE Asia at the moment...

here is the thing though,based purely on my own subjective observations:
your rage is tempered with a humanity that rarely comes across as rage but rather patience.

if you are not a teacher...you should be.
or a zen buddhist...
i confuse the two.

^ Eric's offering covered the curiosity and I had a point-by-point for newtboy but my only remaining suggestion would be to continue to guess about Buddhist concerns regarding earthly affairs and maybe practice the Dharma for another gadjillion ideal lifetimes and figure that one out