Buddhism as "secular spirituality" (2)


Frequently, the people who want to impose their religious beliefs on everyone (the people I call "faith-based imperialists") argue that secularism is a religion, too, so if it is taught in the public schools and so on, so should their beliefs. But calling a secular world view "religious" is like calling a cat a dog and trying to enter it in a dog show.

A particularly clear example of this attempted miraculous cat-to-dog transformation is an article in the online Christianity Today, January 2005, entitled "That Other Church ," by David Klinghoffer.

In it, he essentially makes the claim that scientific knowledge, such as evolutionary theory, and other secular ideas share many characteristics with some religions.

For each element in the Judeo-Christian family of faiths, secularism has its counterpart: a strict ethical code, albeit focusing on health issues ("Thou shalt not smoke," etc.); the use of shame when individuals disregard ethical rules (e.g. fat people); a related promise of eternal life through medical advances; a creation story (Darwinian evolution); and so forth. All that's missing is a deity, but not every religion has one, as the case of Zen Buddhism attests.

(Note the reference to "Zen Buddhism" as an example of an atheistic religion. At least he can accept that such a creature is possible, though whether Buddhism, and especially its Zen variety, should really be called a religion is debatable, in my opinion.)

He wants to set the record straight:

So that everyone can know where everyone else stands, it's time to start identifying the secular faithful as such. The word Secular should be capitalized, indicating a distinctive philosophical orientation. So, just as Mel Gibson is always referred to as a Catholic filmmaker, Michael Moore should be identified as a Secular one.


He is alarmed that

Young children are plainly being targeted for conversion to Secularism, whether in schools or otherwise. The Anti-Defamation League—a group that is Jewish only in the sense that bagels are Jewish—has been advocating a reading list of books for children of kindergarten age through sixth grade. While the emphasis is ostensibly on "anti-bias education," any child who takes to heart the message of these books would be adopting, among other things, a bias in favor of the Secular teaching on homosexuality.

And he ends up with a bit of humor:

Finally, since raising public awareness is the best way to counter conversionary efforts, it would be helpful if a nonprofit organization were established to educate the citizenry about the tendency of the Secular Church to overstep that precious line that is supposed to keep our public institutions free of undue church influence. Such an organization would be dedicated to protecting American civil liberties. You could call it the American Civil Liberties Union.

Oh wait, no, that's taken.

Has Klinghoffer successfully transformed the cat to a dog? You decide. I don't think so.

Posted: Mon - May 2, 2005 at 12:28 PM           | |


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