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Eastern v Western ideology
Are Western spiritual ideologies less accepting than Eastern ideologies taking also into consideration the crusades & the Spanish inquisition? I do know there would be an outrage in our Christian community if a mosque was to be erected in our city & in our Christian community there is a lot of racial discrimination.
I feel only through true acceptance can true spiritual awareness be obtained.
Ed Schulte 50+
I don't want to come across as arrogant here but ....it is hard to find an entry point to your 'Debate' topic. This is because there are too many subjects in your opener ......the Title is Eastern vs Western ....but then your follow up example is about the community objecting to a Mosque in (your?) "Christian" communit
Repeating again ...not snooty/arrogant here ......Islam is one of the three branches of the Abrahamic -Based origin-Religion .( true those Christians who reject the Old Testament and only accept the New Testament would disagree but) ..Christianity is obviously one of the other branches. IOW Islam is not an "Eastern" religion in the trust sense. I could go on to Islam respect all books etc ...instead I will just say that the city I am in has had a Mosque for 100 plus years ( the first in North America ) and the land and construction assistance was donated by the other two branches of the/their Abrahamic religion. ( just saying that in response to your "community" aspect)
Guess that makes me a fence sitter in this "debate" ....because I can't see any reason to choose sides.
Be Well Be Present
EdS
Mathew Naismith 10+
I think there are plenty of entry point here just choose one, answer the question for starters.
Islam & mosques are seen by westerners to being eastern if it is or not however in the question I also related to the Mongols who are eastern who accepted all religions under it’s rule when at about the same time the Christian crusaders weren’t. You have an eastern race who aren’t that religious & who treated their fellow human better than Christians!!!
Love
Mathew
Mark Meijer 100+
Mathew Naismith 10+
This is a very good point Mark........humanly one would have to have no ideologies at all to accept other ideologies however if one was looking at ideologies in a pure spiritual sense which is utterly all accepting of everything ideological principles have no bearing because one is accepting of all.
We see ourselves as just this human crude matter which couldn’t be further from the truth, once we become all accepting we then realise we are not just of this crude matter but of the creator. Would the creator be all accepting? Of course so why can’t we? It’s not easy because of our dogmatisms towards certain ideologies but once one gets past these taught dogmatic principles we are that more accepting & much closer to the creator than any other taught dogmatic ideological humanistic principle.
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Mathew
Shikha Gill
Mathew Naismith 10+
I would have to agree & I think that this is the fundamental mistake we keep making, spiritualism doesn't mean it has to be of a religious nature but like you said it’s inherent to human values, look at what the churches & their religion has done in the past & it’s still going on today, they have nothing to be proud of.
The Mongols slaughtered many but accepted spiritualistic values & beliefs system within their empire but around the same time Christians where slaughtering everyone in the name of God not of their faith including other Christians who lived in acceptance with other faiths.
I’m certainly not putting all Christians in the same non-accepting way because that wouldn’t be anywhere near correct as many Western Christians are now living with & accepting others faiths into their reality. Once one accepts other values without seeing a threat of some kind is a sure sign of true spiritual acceptance.
Scot Wilcox 10+
Paul Kirhagis
Scot Wilcox 10+
Paul Kirhagis
edit: This was on my mind for the last couple hours and It seems that I'm being a little close minded with that statement. I would like to hear more about religions that don't follow this trend
Mathew Naismith 10+
I live in a city of only 22000 people, I feel this might have something to do with the discrimination as in our larger cities it's quite different.
Eastern spiritual ideologies have become quite popular in the west, I'm just wondering is it because it's more tolerant & accepting?
It is funny that we are pointing our fingers at the Muslims at the moment & in some cases calling them Satanists, westerners have nothing to be proud of as they also have used religion to their own ends.
What is also funny is that we have religious wars that westerners will say it has nothing to do with spiritual ideologies on their part but it's quite different for the Easterners. With the crusades & the Spanish Inquisition the Christians slaughtered Christians as well who dared live with Muslims, I think there is a huge discriminative ideology here from the west & it's obviously still there even though we Westerners are becoming more tolerant & accepting.
Scot Wilcox 10+
Mathew Naismith 10+
I could counteract that with how the Mongols accepted different religions under its domination even after the slaughter. The Mongolian expansion started in 1206 & ended in 1294, the crusades begun in 1095-1291, there was very little tolerance by the Christians towards other religions & even Christians living with Muslims, they were all slaughtered but the non-Christina Mongols where more tolerant.
When the Seljuk Turks decisively defeated the Byzantine army in 1071 they lived with the Christians but did this happen especially over in Spain? They even killed or kicked out the Jews because they were of a different religion, it has everything to do with spiritual values because this was the main driving force. Would the Christians have slaughter the Muslims in the name of God if they weren’t Christian, religious or spiritual? Very doubtful.
What about the 30 year war from 1618-1648? I’m sorry but all these wars accept for the Mongols were religiously fuelled & supported, here you get a basically non-religious Eastern race being more accepting than Western religiously dominated race of people!!
Us Christian orientated Westerners have been stepping all over the Easterners since the crusades invading their lands & raping & pillaging their lands & we are still doing this today. I could point out so many facts about how Christian orientated people have been so intolerant in the past it’s not funny. Religion & spirituality are at the very core of most cultures, sorry but you can’t split spirituality away from culture as it’s a fundamental part of that culture even if they have dropped the practices in spiritual ritualism.
I’m a Christian oriented person myself because that’s the culture I was brought up in, even our laws are Christian orientated but I do see the plight of the Easterners by Western Christian orientated people, the Eastern past isn’t perfect but it seems to me to be a little more accepting towards others even in time of war than Christians.
greg dahlen 20+