A humble theory about religion and morality and what it takes to be a good person

Please let me contribute my humble dime to the discussion. I am sorry beforehand, if something I say here is not precise from a historical, or cultural point of view - please correct me if it is so and pardon my ignorance, if it appears here. The idea is, I have lived in about four different religious families and atheistic families also. I am a sincere try-to-follower of the Buddha’s teaching, but I don’t believe in life after death, so I am an atheist. In my opinion, we should separate the notion of a religion as a teaching, from religion as, say, a church - a social organization, which unlike the initial teaching has its goal only in gaining power and money. I was born and raised in an orthodox Christianity family. And I can tell from my experience that the social organization of the orthodox church has nothing to do with the precepts, formulated by Jesus (if such a person existed at all). So I would say it is not Christianity, that has failed to achieve its 2000 year goal, it is people who failed. Indeed, basically any humane teaching says about similar things, at least more or less so. For example, what are those precepts we can see in the New Testament? Don’t kill, don’t steal, don’t commit adultery, if you only think about something imperfect, it is as if you have already committed it, so keep your thoughts clean. Basically the same things that the Buddha said. Also, Matthew chapter four says - don’t call anybody a teacher, a pastor, or father… And yet in any church of any denomination you address a cleric as a “father”, or “pastor” - a direct violation of the source. Also, Matthew says - when you want to pray, go to your room, lock the door and in loneliness pray to God. What do we see in the church? Crowds of people, divine services and so on. The New Testament forbids trying to convert people into Christianity - it is Matthew chapter 22, if I am not making a mistake. And again, what do we see the church does? And at all, the new testament says nothing about how you are supposed to sing, which fumes to smoke, which spell to mumble. So none of that is said in the Scripture. Also we must not forget that for the first several centuries Christian teaching was transferred orally and knowing people - come on guys, it is obvious that very little of the original words could survive. So we see a blunt substitution of values. Instead of trying to be a good person, you just need to go to the church, mumble something, pay a bit and voila - your sins are abolished, you can go continue having the same life. In terms of Orthodox Christianity I have even seen them to edit the scriptures to violate one of Jesus precepts - not to get angry in any circumstances ever at all.
With Buddhism in certain countries it is about the same I think. How about monk-warriors in Japan? Come on, seriously?? Buddhism and war??! I don’t know… I think it is not really a religion that makes people bad, or good, it is people themselves do everything to have it so. I can say that people can take any great idea and turn it into something quite vile. That is what I saw in Russian politics also - we had so called “communism” and lived poorly and now we have “capitalism” and still live the same poor way, just the sauce is different.
So in terms of the article, I think it is not about if a family is religious or not, it is about if a family is ethical or not. And one can be ethical being an atheist, and one can be unethical being religious. I have seen many kind and ethical atheists, I have seen many unethical and vicious atheists; I have seen great kind Christians and Buddhists and I have seen many quite unethical Christians and Buddhists, who did nothing else, but just mumbled some prayers (in the case of christians) and performed some bows (in the case of Buddhists), but no sooner had they finished, continued their dirty life. Once I saw a great person, who really tried to live well, taking responsibility for his thoughts and actions, who tried to be kind. How amazed was I when I found out that he was… An Jehovah witness! Again, let’s not mix religions as ethical precepts with Churches as social institutions, raising zombies. Of course all those bad things have been more pronounced in Christian countries, rather then in Buddhist contries. Perhaps it is so because in case of the Buddhism there is no one person, like the Pope, who has all the power in his hands and who is the only right person.
Anyway, as an example of ethics, look at Tolstoi. He considered himself to be a Christian, but was anathematized by the Church, exactly because he said that the Church was a criminal institution.
So, shortly speaking, we can raise children being ethical, or unethical and it is not a question of a particular religion, but a question of us following a good and kind life style. Basically, if we just tell our children - “don’t do to your neighbor what you don’t want to be done to yourself” - it will really rise the odds of bringing up a “humane human”.
Pardon such a messy and long post.

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atheist is one who doesn’t believe in a creator god from a-theos - no-god, disbelief in the afterlife doesn’t make one an atheist, Biblical Judaic view for example (shared by Jehovah witnesses) doesn’t subscribe to the idea of bodiless afterlife while recognizing the existence of a creator god[/details]

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Yes, thank you for the correction, and I don’t believe in the God - creator either :slight_smile:

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[quote=“skfir”]
I don’t believe in life after death, so I am an atheist
[/quote]This could be ucchedavāda (philosophy of annihilation) rather than atheism (although the two oft’ overlap). Ultimately it depends upon how one defines “life” and “death”, IMO.

US Mormons Engage in Buddhist Mindfulness Practices

https://www.buddhistdoor.net/news/mormons-in-us-engage-in-buddhist-mindfulness-practices-

:anjal: