Tuesday, March 4, 2008

Comparative Religions

My new class for this session at CBU, is Comparative Religions. It's basically World Religions, but from a Christian perspective. This class is aimed to educate the students on how other religions compare to Christianity. My teacher grew up in Thailand, so she learned how important world views are, and how Buddhism and Hinduism relates to Christianity. She is a committed Christian, and her only goal for the class is to introduce the other religions to us, and make us aware of how different they are from the Christian faith. I look forward to learning a lot in this class, and I believe this knowledge will give me a greater respect for my own beliefs. I am a Christian, but I know very little about the world faiths or how they view Christians. I look forward to learning all knowledge that my professor has to offer. Maybe I can share what I learn with the other members of The Journey. There is much many of us don't know about Hinduism, Buddhism, Judaism, and Islam. I might be able to offer a different perspective of these religions. We'll see......

1 comment:

The U-Man said...

I minored in religion at APU and I particularly enjoyed my comparative religions class. Our teacher was former muslim shunned and stripped of his family rights after converting to Christ. He is now an associate pastor and professor in CA.

It really is fascinating how God created us to interact with the spiritual realm. Even counterfeit faiths tap into our nature as both physical and spiritual beings.

Many americans today have the naive notions that somehow all religions are basically the same, that as long as they teach morality and belief in some kind of higher power then who are they to say what's right or suggest you might be on the wrong path.

It is so important to think through the actual differences between religious and spiritual teachings. The doctrinal similarities are superficial. The core of religious belief systems are quite distinct. Sure they all attempt to meet universal human needs and answer ultimate questions. But they come to very different conclusions.

There is some truth in almost any religion. But the core is what matters. In the end, either every religion is equally ficitonal and fantastical, as the atheists assert, or only one can be true.