Intercession Day

One of the other weekly things we do here on campus is "base intercession".  Last week on Wed I was up on and off all night with terrible "dreams" of being attacked and muffled by what seemed to be invisible beings.  Yeah, weird I know, at least to most.

I woke up wondering what it was all about and wrote the "dreams" down.  It wasn't until I "woke" that I had any idea that it wasn't real, so vivid.  That morning, was about Buddhism.  What I thought was cool was that it wasn't about how "they" are wrong but more informative.  We have the ropes course here which includes lots of steps so at the bottom of the steps and every 10 or so steps was a piece of paper with some facts about the land, the people, the history, the morality and religion. 

I had studied Buddhism when I was a teen but much of the information felt knew and a good reminder.  What I was struck by is that those who adhere to Buddhism are very moral.  The tenants are very similar to Judaism and Christianity, tell the truth, help others, do not be concerned with material things, watch what you say and how you affect others, among many others.  Plus, most Buddhists do not worship Buddha as God, as I have so often heard in Christian circles. 

Once we were all finished on our walk, we met in the prayer chapel, which is a beautiful room with one whole wall of just windows overlooking a forest of trees.  Very cool.  There was a pile of shoes upon walking in, in tradition of the peoples from the area.  We all sat in one giant circle and shared.  One person was struck by the same thing, how moral and religious "they" are.  By contrast, how Christians in general and in America, are not so much.  In fact, Christianity has a pretty foul name among non-Christians.  I was in a meeting in Gaza before it was so volatile and the teacher, a Muslim, said "why would I want to be a Christian when your men cannot even stay faithful and have to have conferences like Promise Keepers to just do what is right?"  Wow.

I know there are lots of Christians who are moral and who do make every effort to really help the fatherless, the widows and the orphans (the definition of true religion according to james).  My brother is one.  I know also that this is across all religions, there is the few and the masses.  The devout and the occasional. 

It just caused me to think alot.  In my years in the Christian churches, there has always been an "us and them" mentality.  It bothers me.  When I read these facts, rather than consider myself more holy or a better graps on the truth, I thought of them (there it is again) as truly brothers.  Sure I prayed for "them" but this time it was no different than praying for my mom, my friend, my daughter, myself. 

On a different note, I keep the "law" of the "old" testament, I call it Tanakh and my reasonable act of worship for my love of G-d.  Typically, Christians do not adhere to any set law, the standards of morality have become pretty subjective, the standards of obedience obscure.  I imagine when other faiths read facts about Christianity, what do they think?  Would they say we're moral?  Known for helping others? Devout to our beliefs?  I don't know...

But I sure like thinking and praying about all this :-)