Meditation study shows changes associated with awareness, stress (2011)

>> But you consider yourself agnostic probably? Or atheist... >And of course you don't see any contradiction here. >Buddhism is nontheistic, so no contradiction...

Buddhist friend from Japan claims otherwise. Many Gods in Buddhism. Taking the religion and cutting out whatever not convenient so Westerners will still pay for the privilege. That's what they did to promote buddhism in US and make money on it. Still it is like puzzle with missing pieces then.

You know Jesuits (yep, these evil dudes) have their own ways to meditate, their own way look on things like economics (gold standard has been widely discussed among Jesuits since middle ages), etc. One could take whatever is convenient there too, say there is no God, and just end up with some kind of philosophy. My point is that it's not like in your own civilization you don't have some deep thoughts or ways to meditate, it is just that they aren't fashionable at the moment. Or maybe christians are too focused on Jesus Christ to notice all this stuff that was developed within this religion across centuries.

>> You probably would be better off omitting this spiritual junk food of new age instead altogether. >In favour of what?

Something closer to our own civilization. I think I believe in God. I go to church very rarely though. I'm not deep believer. I hate all the bad things Catholic Church has been doing. Especially to children. But Im not obsessed with them too. I'm not a good Catholic at all. But for me changing this altogether to be more Eastern would be a mistake. You are still under influence of a religious thought. The difference is that it is foreign to the culture where you function daily. It's like changing big comfortable armchair for a wooden chair. Maybe you don't want to sit at home at all, but still better to have an armchair.

When I was a child (maybe 8 year old) I was slapped in face by a priest during mess. Others, friends saw it. It was because I wanted to leave the mess. Because I was feeling really bad/dizzy. The point to understand is that this priest is a really, really bad christian. He isn't God.

If you want to pick and choose. At least do it within your culture. Pick and choose values in your own culture that make sense to you.

Omit these bad Christians who hurt you. I'm sure there are bad buddhist monks who hurt their own too. See through that. Might be intellectually interesting.

Gold Standard and Jesuits: they figured out that fiat money always ends up with inflation (stealing the value of money by the King/Government). So they figured gold standard is good as it makes stealing money from people more difficult. Now, just imagine the parallel between this and for example what many modern economists say. They might not even know that a lot of libertarian economic thought had its roots in Jesuits "philosophy". Religion touches every aspect of our lives. Should FED be abolished? There were guys in habits thinking about it 500 years ago. Just saying it is cool to see these parallels within your culture. If I studied buddhism instead I wouldn't be able to see them. Not sure if bddhism has anything on money standards or economics.

But again, I write this, and will go to church rarely. Christianity is just important part of our culture. It is school of thought too. But instead of insulating you from the world (i.e. issues, economy, whatever), it is strongly embedded in it. It actually defined our culture whether we like it or not. For Jesus Christ we have Marxist priests. How they connect the two, I don't know, but shows you how deep some of these philosophies can be, even though we are not aware of them.

The cult stuff? It's somewhat understandable. I think timeofgifts summed it up pretty well. You're essentially giving up your freedom for 10 days and are asked to do some things that may seem rather strange (e.g., bowing and chanting). It's normal to freak out and to want to leave, and you'll come up with a number of reasons to do so. I was miserable for a majority of the 10 days and desperately wanted to leave. But I also recognized this urge as just more "mind stuff", and the reason I was there was to learn to stop reacting to this stuff.

Another point that hasn't been mentioned is that these courses are funded entirely by donations. This is why they want you to work hard and take your time there seriously. This is also why they really discourage people from leaving early. There are typically long wait lists for these courses and they don't want to "waste" spots on people that are going to leave early or not take it seriously.

I have attended two of these courses, and have benefited extremely from them, and I know they try very, very hard to make sure that they do not become a cult. They are very anti-cult, and I think it is important that this remains a priority.

I was diagnosed with panic disorder and no treatment worked, but after attending a course I was able to get it under control.

It's not like a marathon - preparation isn't really going to help you much. It's much more like "meditation bootcamp" - breaking down is part of the building process.

> Buddhist friend from Japan claims otherwise. Many Gods in Buddhism

> For Jesus Christ we have Marxist priests. How they connect the two, I don't know

> Not sure if bddhism has anything on money standards or economics.

For someone who knows next to nothing about either religion they're talking about, that sure was a long post.

Anyway, in case you want to learn anything about something "far from our civilization" (as if everyone on this site was in the western world...), there are many kinds of Buddhism, and many of them are atheistic (which makes sense, seeing as the Buddha himself denied the existence of any creator Gods: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/God_in_Buddhism )