Enlightened Quilt : 03.04.03 @ 2:54 pm

Yours truly spent the day alternating between learning painful subjects such as Algebra and Chemistry, watching my grade go down in all of my black day classes... and studying the philosophies of Buddhism.
The book I bought for philosophy class? Yea. It's called Buddhism: Plain & Simple (by Steve Hagen, view amazon link here) and it rocks my socks. I'm not done the book yet, but I could barely pass a page without high lighting something, dog earring the page, or writing little notes in the margins. I don't know if I like the concepts of Buddhism enough to seriously look into it some more... probably not. I'm quite content with being Agnostic...

Buddhism, like just about every organized religion somehow manages to twist the pure concepts of the way of life. Organized religion is led by the people who are a part of it (not necessarily the leaders, but the masses), and people are corrupt.

Better to take what I believe in from each of these religions, sew them together with the thread of my personal philosophies, and keep myself warm and sane with the quilt it makes.

What a beautiful, diverse quilt that would make.

Have you ever noticed that Atheists are often not at peace with themselves? Perhaps that is not the right word for it. Many that I have talked to seem angry and rebellious... like they are atheists only because the rest of the world believes in a deity. Not all... just some.
I am not dissing atheists, for I was one at a time... Now I'm just some Agnostic Humanist Hybrid. I am quite peaceful when it comes to theological debates, until someone tries to tell me that whatever I happen to believe is wrong. Christians do this, as do Atheists.
And they both point to each other like little squabbling children and say - "You're forcing your beliefs on me!"

First and foremost, there is no good and evil. Both are a point of view that will fluctuate throughout time and are based entirely on the individual who is labeling something "good" or "bad".
An example, if you will. George W. Bush, along with many other Americans, believe that Iraq is evil and probably 99% of them believe that Osama bin Laden is evil.
Bin Laden believes that the United States is evil, and many Iraqis probably do as well.

It is because good and evil are points of view that such a paradox can exist. Neither party is wrong, and their opinions may change in the future.
After all, Regan once called Bin Laden a "Freedom Fighter", in the positive light. You may argue that it is Bin Laden that has changed, not our point of view (You may also argue that Regan was a moron, but that is not the issue at hand), but while Bin Laden did change, so did we and so did our opinions.

In another point (right or wrong), your personal faith is neither right nor wrong, for it can not be because there is no absolute Truth in the realm of thoughts. Someone seeking the Truth for personal enlightenment will not find the Truth and will instead find him(her)self farther away from the "Truth".

Second, because there is true right or wrong, good or evil, there are no moral crimes, only crimes against society. Murder, rape, adultery, perjury and the like are not morally wrong because in one society (one point of view) opinions on the "crime" will differ from another. Murder, rape, adultery, and perjury et. al are crimes against society because they tear apart an individual (the victim) and in turn tear apart society for society is made up of individuals.

Third, love with all of your being, indiscriminately, it will return to you two fold.

Fourth, in the scheme of things, it does not matter what you believe. It does not matter what you do to improve your standing, your wealth, your education or even what you do to enrich yourself, only what you do to enrich the lives of others.
When you die, you're not going to care if you lived a "holy" life. You're not going to care that you were wealthy or educated. You're going to be dead, and dead people simply don't do such things.
What does matter is the living. What does matter is the impact you left behind, the people you left behind. How did you affect them? How did you effect your society? Did you even do either?

I think I'm going to make a "to do" page... instead of talking about it all the time.

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