Americans are “becoming more like Hindus” . In support of this view, Lisa Miller, in a Newsweek article, cites some startling statistics: 65% Americans believe that “many religions lead to eternal life”, 24% call themselves “spiritual, not religious”, 24% believe in reincarnation and “more than a third now choose cremation”.
This change directly flows from the almost unfettered freedom to question, without any fear, the reduction of the limitless dimensions of God into a book or two, with competing claims that that is all that there is to Him.
Buddha once told his followers that they should not believe the word of any holy man or book, even of Buddha himself. He asked them to walk their own paths and find the answers themselves.
2500 years later, America seems to be taking that walk.
2 comments:
This is so true! 'He asked them to walk their own paths and find the answers themselves.' - I think that is the essential bit.
Smitha, it is. You will rarely find a religious leader willing to let go control. Control is central to religion and superfluous to spirituality.
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