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Religion 101

In my previous blog entry (Part One of this pair of posts), I described and illustrated how Christianity worldwide breaks down, in terms of its various branches, wings, and internal subdivisions: Now, moving from a broadly global perspective to a narrowly national one, we can see at once that a similar breakdown of American Christianity…

For those who may not know, Christianity is the single largest religion in the world. Of course, by “Christianity” I do not merely mean, say, evangelical Christianity alone, or any other single subset of the Christian faith (some of whose adherents tend to monopolize the term, applying the epithet “Christian” exclusively to themselves alone). By…

When I was new to religious studies (or “comparative religion”), whenever I initially began the study of any particular religion, I always wondered, “How many of these guys are there, in the world? Is this a really big religion? A really small religion? A medium-sized religion? If it’s big, how big? If it’s small, how…

Today (November 13, 2012) marks the first day of a major five-day religious festival — in fact, the largest and single most important holiday on the Hindu religious calendar. Observed in India and beyond not only by Hindus but also by Jains, Sikhs, and even some Buddhists, Diwali (“festival of lights”) is characteristically celebrated by…

Election Day (November 6, 2012) did more than give Barack Obama a second term in office as the U.S. president. Among other things, it also gave us America’s first Hindu congresswoman, as well as its first Buddhist senator. Tulsi Gabbard, democratic congresswoman representing Hawaii’s 2nd congressional district, made history when voters elected her to be…

In my previous blog post, I asked the perennial and fundamental question: Out of all of these many diverse religions, major and minor, which one of them (if any) happens to be, you know, true? In other words, which of the world’s religions affirms religious concepts and asserts religious claims which are objectively factual, correct,…

Okay, this is it. The $64,000 question. For many people, this one is the really big, bottom-line uber question — the most central and most burning of all questions pertaining to religion. Out of all of these many diverse religions, major and minor, which one of them (if any) happens to be, you know, true? Sometimes…

It’s a common enough question, and one that is often posed less as an actual question than as a simple observation, or even as a subtle assertion: “When you get right down to it, aren’t all religions really just saying the same thing?” Well, yes and no. It depends upon what you think they are…

At sunset today (October 31, 2012), a significant holiday on the religious calendars of Wiccans and other Neopagans will begin. However, which particular Wiccan holiday it happens to be will vary, depending upon which particular hemisphere of the world — the northern, or the southern — you happen to reside in. In the Northern Hemisphere,…

Or, to put the question more precisely: how internally diverse are each of the world’s religions? Most people understand that the religious landscape is a very diverse place. A plurality of different religions, major and minor, exist in the world, each believing different things. Judaism is different from Hinduism; Christianity is different from Buddhism. Islam…
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