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How do you think religion in the West will interact with the Culture War in the next few elections, and in the future? Up until recently, the religious right seemed to be a mainstay of at least American politics. In Europe of course, Christianity is mostly an irrelevant force (though theoretically Catholics should have some weight?).
However, the evangelical right has been losing quite a bit of power and cultural cachet, and we're seeing the rise of more traditional versions of Christianity such as Catholicism and to a lesser extent, Orthodoxy. Buddhism has also made inroads in a more serious way, as well as Islam mostly via immigration of Muslim peoples.
In the future, how will these religions impact politics? Personally I see a fusion of Buddhism x Christianity already happening, and expect a sort of Christian orthodoxy mixing in Buddhism mental techniques as the most successful religion of the 21st century. That being said, I feel it could shake out in many different areas on the political spectrum - ironically, many of the Orthodox priests I know personally are surprisingly liberal.
One area we could see a resurgence is in monasteries, and the potential downstream impact in local communities. Within the Catholic community (and Orthodoxy in the U.S.) there has been a groundswell lately of pushes for more monasteries, and revitalizing the monastic order in general. We'll see how it shakes out.
Tell me, what do you think religion will do to the modern political landscape?
What things do you think that Buddhism offers that Christianity does not?
Not being against the Gays is one of the more salient points. Christianity being seen as anti-Gay has significantly harmed it's worth as a moral philosophy to modern western people. Also why the texts of Christianity are very anti materialist it tends not to be seen that way in the US.
No, this is not true at all from my perspective. Not only is it not one of the things Buddhism offers, Buddhism itself is strongly against gays, and also women. If you look into the roots of the Buddhist tradition there is far stronger sentiment and prohibitions against sexual perversion than in mainstream Christianity.
That being said, I do think the modern Church has a perhaps too myopic focus on sexual sin sometimes.
Not Western Buddhism as practiced in America no it isn't. Scripture will only get you so far, Paul discourages marriage in his letters yet to say American Christianity is against marriage and procreation would be foolish. Not all Christian denominations were against Gay marriage in the culture war either but the overwhelming perspective of secularish young people is that Christianity has a lot of nonsensical rules about sex and Buddhism doesn't. I don't think Buddhism is going to hugely boom up. But it's definitely an advantage as you get a lot less pushback being a Buddhist in certain circles than a Christian and it's easier to syncretize with modern progressive values.
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Rather like the joke regarding the expanding acronym that no one has less in common than gays and asexuals, no one should think a tradition that opposes hedonism and considers all pleasure to be a distraction would approve of gays.
That said, I can easily see how one would conclude that American Buddhism, such as it is, has had very little to say about interpersonal pleasure and much more about, say, animal welfare.
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