Hi Pink,
I agree with many of your comments in this post. A few quibbles:
pink_trike wrote:... people who are self-acknowledged religionists have no interest in looking directly at the concept of "religion" or looking directly at the experience of religiosity - looking at both with a dispassionate distancing.
I feel this statement would be more accurate if you would add the the word "some" to it, as in "
some people who are self-acknowledged religionists" etc. Otherwise I believe you are overgeneralizing. As a matter of fact, some self-acknowledged religionists have a great deal of interest in looking directly at the concept of "religion" and so forth.
pink_trike wrote:And yet the media is full of religious leaders and spokespersons who talk endlessly and even aggressively about how religion is "under attack" and about how religious people are being "persecuted". And it seems that it's the rare religious person who has or is willing to look critically at and thoroughly unpack the concept of "religion" itself or the mind-state of religiosity - or to question why certain realms of human inquiry are put in the "religion" box with the expectation that everyone will respect any beliefs put there, and that everyone will refrain from questioning the beliefs because they've been labeled "religious".
Besides the religious leaders and spokespersons of which the media is full, there are additional religious persons who get less attention yet may better reflect the broad range of relative open-mindedness you'd expect to find within any social set. If you're basing your views of "self-acknowledged religionists" on what you see on TV, that's an insufficient sample.
pink_trike wrote:Not all mind-states or beliefs (even those that enjoy protected status as "religion) are benign, and all are subject to critical analysis (this is quite consistent with the Dharma - though many Buddhist religionists would likely feel compelled to disagree).
There's a difference between critical analysis and wholesale dismissal. The former is consistent with Buddhadhamma; the latter is not, in my opinion.
pink_trike wrote:If a particular set of beliefs can only have meaning within a closed logic system under the protective rubric of "religion"...and if the _concept of religion_ and the _mind-state of religiosity_ can't be questioned and demand respect simply because they are "religion" and therefore must be respected...and if there can be no critical examination of beliefs that are put in the "religious" box, and no critical examination of what causes people to fall into mind-states of religiosity
... that's a lot of ifs ...
pink_trike wrote: - then it's understandable why a growing number of people are increasingly not interested in religion.
especially if those people only choose to look at those elements of religion that are objectionable and disregard other elements.
pink_trike wrote:Religion partitions itself off from critical analysis and then feels attacked when people ignore the partition and look at religion and the mind-state of religiosity nakedly.
No it doesn't. At least not necessarily. Sounds like you're overgeneralizing again.
pink_trike wrote:... a careful examination of the mind-state of religiosity isn't ridicule.
To me it seems like a carefree examination rather than a careful one, to put a charitable spin on it.
Metta