UU Salad Bar (ritual, Deist, tradition, Buddhism, beliefs)

[Trey of Diamonds]

Adherents.com has a list of the worlds Major Religions Ranked by Size and it made me wonder how many of them were represented within the UU population. Take a look at all the selections and pick the religion(s) you feel you identify with. It doesn't have to be exact or only one, any that you draw from spiritually. I myself feel that I have connections with both Christianity and Islam with some Taoism thrown in for good measure.

So if this is our UU Salad Bar, what would you select from.

Adherents.com is a growing collection of over 43,870 adherent statistics and religious geography citations:

[Trey of Diamonds]

Also, you can check the link to the list to get a more detail view of a selection. For example, Chinese Traditional Religions include Confucianism and Taoism. Neo-Pagan includes Wiccan, Druidism, etc.

My other selection is my own personal theory that all religions are merely different perceptions of the same universal force.

[Kungfuzed]

I'd say my beliefs are influenced mostly by Christianity (specifically LDS), Secular Humanism, and Buddhism, at least philisophically. I live a clean healthy life, don't believe in God, and I'm one with the universe.

[Storm]

I chose
1) Secular/ Nonreligious/ etc. because the individual who's been the biggest influence on me is my Deist father
2) Neopagan because that's the path that I grew out of
3) Other for my own brand of panentheism

[Green Gaia]

Christianity (as much as I've tried to leave it, it's what I know best and I do still find value in some of the teachings)
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist
Buddhism
Neo-Paganism

[LadyGreenstone]

Christianity only as it pertains to the following:
Hinduism
Buddhism
Judaism - specifically the kaballah which is paganish
Jainism
Neo-Paganism

[lilithu]

Hi Trey, namaste.

I don't understand the question. Are we to select which religions influence us, or which we identify with? I'm influenced by many religions but I only identify as one. I'm UU.

[Trey of Diamonds]

Originally Posted by lilithu

Hi Trey, namaste.

I don't understand the question. Are we to select which religions influence us, or which we identify with? I'm influenced by many religions but I only identify as one. I'm UU.

In your context I would say influence. Basically, at the great Salad Bar of religion, from which do you add to your plate?

[Wolfscout1]

Christianity
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist
Buddhism
Primal-Indigenous
Neo-Paganism
I think all the above and more are covered by my accepting UUism.

[Trey of Diamonds]

I thought I would detail the reasons for my choices. Feel free to do so for your choices too but it isn't necessary.

Christianity
I was raised Southern Baptist and so have the most experience and knowledge within the Christian Faith. However, in my teens I lived in Muslim countries and had several Muslim friends. The Baptist church I was going to said that they were all going to Hell because they had not accepted Christ as their savior. So I decided I was not going to be a Baptist.

Islam
As mentioned I spent several years in Muslim countries and learned that Muslim kids make just as good of friends as Christian kids. Later, I began to enjoy history and I studied the history of Islam and found that it was a rich and amazing story, nothing like what the Baptist believed and preached of them.
One of the things I draw from Islam is the fact that there are three ways into Heaven rather than the one believed by Christians. In Islam you can get to Heaven by observing God in the Universe (through nature), through the scriptures or through the prophets. It always seemed to me that they were more open than the Christians if they offered more ways to get to Heaven.

Chinese Traditional Religion
From Taoism I take the concept of Universal Balance, Yin and Yang.

Jainism
I like the idea of Karma and I think Jainism has the best model for how Karma works.

Other
My other is a personal theory I have about religion. I feel that all religions are nothing more than multiple human perceptions of the same thing. Each is structured to be supportive of the culture and enviornment it was created in. As for what that "thing" is, I like to think of it as positive and negative energy that exists throughout all the universe. What we call God is the personification of Positive energy while Satan is the personification of negative energy. The only real question for me is whether or not these forces of energy are self aware or if they simply exist and we personify them in order to better understand them? Oh, that and the other really big question, are the energies separate or two halves of the whole? For if they are two halves of a whole then God and Satan are the same being.