Religions were based on different factors, beliefs, cultures, practices and interpretations of different prophecies. Religious beliefs had existed for the past centuries, and its existence had drawn different reactions to different kinds of people.
Most people lived to know and follow a religion that somehow dictates or influence their way of living. Christian faith had never been spared of these criticisms. It is in fact the most criticized religion. One philosopher, Ludwig Andreas von Feuerbach had never ceased to attack religion. He said: “Christianity has in fact long vanished not only from the reason but from the life of mankind, that it is nothing more than a fixed idea"In addition to this, Philip and Cherian said the existence of the New Testament has caused more damage to the Christian faith since the teaching found in the New Testament were in contrary to the beliefs of the heretics, criticizers and rebel Christians.
Does saying such comment about Christianity and religion meant that he had lived a life without believing in God, and everything including us had just popped out somewhere and started to multiply, creating such world population that we have right now?What is his way of living? I can connect such way of life in practices that doesn’t worship any God, but of living life to the fullest with full focus of ones self. Such focus of achieving the higher self is practiced by Buddhism. So this made me ask further. Are Christianity and Buddhism two different religious faith that practices different way of lives? My study about one sect of Christianity which is Catholicism and of Buddhism made me arrive to conclusions that made me realize that everything are in one way or another, are so closely connected. With this, this paper will discuss the differences of the beliefs and practices of Catholicism and Buddhism. It will further prove that they are connected, and that Feuerbach’s comment about religion is groundless.
The Place of Worship Catholics and Buddhist’s place of prayer is physically different yet very similar in every way. They are different because Catholics Church is composed of statues and paintings of Jesus, Mary and Joseph. In the center behind the stage, which you can see upon entering was a big cross with the crucified Jesus, and then on both sides were the statue of Mary and Joseph, the foster parent of Jesus. You can also find other statues of several saints as well, together with a painting of the risen Lord ascending towards heaven. A stained glass in several frames surrounded the church.
Inside each frame is a chapter or a segment of the Passion of Christ until his crucifixion. The church is also adorned with different flowers.On the other hand, Buddhist temple is a red and golden temple, with pillars carved with ethnic and Buddhist patterns of gold, with pots of flowers and dragons among little Buddha creatures, sitting crossed legged. Upon entering, a very huge golden statue of Buddha, seated crossed legged in a form of meditation with a golden sun-like glowing halo at the back.
That very huge statue is almost as tall as the ceiling, placed in the very center in front of the temple, between two huge white pillars, with a hanging golden curtain. Right in front of it are smaller statues of Buddha, and then again, right in front of this set of Buddha’s are another smaller versions of Buddha. It gets smaller and smaller, composing of more or less ten of them.Then at the base of each huge pillar, are two different faces of the statue of Buddha seated on piles of what looked like golden coffins. There are also several masks together with marigolds which adorned the altar.
Different, ain’t it? However it is very similar in the spiritual aspect. Both have big statues of the originator of this faith, in front of what seemed like a stage, where you can see right upon entering the temple. Aside from that, the chosen statue which stands as the center piece of the temple had significant meanings. You see, there are many images of Christ and Buddha, either standing, laughing, talking or preaching.But why is it that the centerpiece of the Catholic Church is of the crucified Christ, a picture of pain and suffering, dying and losing? On the other hand, Buddha’s statue was sitting crossed legged, closing his eyes, as if sleeping.
Looking at its deeper meaning however, these center piece statues are not merely statues. The crucified Christ stands for the symbol of freedom and being saved from sins, where Christ died on the cross to save people from evil. It is of Freedom and a new beginning. His dying on the cross redeemed the world and a start of Christianity. On the other hand, Buddha’s statue also stands for freedom and new beginning. It is a statue of Buddha who had fulfilled his mission of finding inner peace.
Finding his true self, being enlightened. It is the symbol of freedom from the pain and suffering that he finds around him, focusing more of himself and starting a new life by helping others. It is a beginning of the new way of life.Ways of Worshipping A Catholics worship involves several processes of kneeling, singing, preaching and acknowledging the host and wine, as a representation of the body and blood of Christ, which, which they eat and drink during the last part of the Mass. They rise up and say, Christ has died, Christ has Risen and Christ will come again, as a sign of renewing their faith towards Christ.That was called their proclamation after the Consecration.
There is an offering of tights and peace offering to their brothers and sisters. There is a prayer for the sick and for the dead, as well as special intentions. They also perform actions and symbolizations. The Buddhists ways of worship involves chanting and kneeling. It is observed that both perform kneeling during the ceremony.
This is because, kneeling is a form of humbling yourself down and acknowledge the message, gift and blessing from God.Beliefs and Practices The Catholic’s Eucharistic celebration, the paschal mystery of Christ, the center of their Christian faith, is recalled and made present. In the Catholics liturgical calendar, the Paschal Mystery is celebrated each year during the Solemnity of Easter, which the call, the feast of all feasts. During this Holy week, the week before Easter, Catholics believe that by performing and experiencing the trials during the passion of Christ, these trials and difficulties are part of their journey as members of the church, in working out their salvation.
By joining the Liturgy, Catholics believe that they are able to walk with Christ, the way of the cross, and then finally share with him the victory of the Resurrection.They further believe that their Sunday Eucharist is their way of re-enacting this self-giving of Jesus, and of receiving strength from him. On the other hand, Reincarnation or living past lives were known as beliefs of Buddhism. So Siddhartha, being human that he is, I asked a monk if he had also reincarnated, which to my astonishment, the monk replied yes. Where in fact, he had lived 500 past lives before he had achieved the consciousness of his higher mind and achieving inner peace. The beginnings of Buddhism, based from Gary and Evelyn Harthcock’s quote from Paul Wagner (no date) teachings in Buddhism comes in different teachings that came from Animism, Hinduism, Judaism and other religions, cultures and world views, including the belief of the upcoming Christianity and of the coming of the savior Jesus Christ.
Rahula (1999) had discussed the Buddhists beliefs and teachings which are mainly: The Doctrine of the Four Noble Truths, Noble Eight-fold Path, the Five, Aggregates, Karma, Rebirth, Conditioned Genesis, The Doctrine of No Soul and The Setting Up of Mindfulness. All these support the natural evolution of the True self, where the person develops it self- definition. Paradoxically, it is often through experiencing the not-self that we learn who the “Self” is. Since followers live in a world of duality, they learn by experiencing the opposites.
One example a monk had cited was, a follower may try on certain roles, job titles and characterization during his life, only to discover after practicing them for a while, that they were someone else’s idea of who he was rather than a true part of his self.Catholics somehow believes that if you want to grow, then you must look to Jesus Christ who taught us the sure way to growth. His way is different from what we or the people around us would usually follow. In order to carry out this mission faithfully, the church counts and continued presence of Christ the Head through the leaders and persons in authority. There are the Pope, who stands as the Vicar of Christ, and the bishops, who were the successors of the apostles.
There are the priests and deacons who exercise authority because they too have received the gift of orders.Then there are the lay people, who are called to serve as leaders by reason f their Baptism, and because of the lack of ordained ministers. The Catholics Nicene Creedmentioned the four main marks of the Church when they say: “I believe in one, holy catholic and apostolic Church”. The priest said that these are the special marks of the Church founded by Christ which are unity represented by “one”, holiness represented by “holy”, universality which is represented by “catholic”, and rootedness in the apostles preaching or represented in the word “apostolic”. He explained that unity in the Church is realized in the communion of all the members of the Church around Peter’s successor, the Pope.This unity can be seen in the way Christians of diverse cultures come together, like the members of the body working in unity for the good of the entire body.
This unity of the Church is best expressed in the Sacrament of the Eucharist. Similarly enough, the Buddhist believe in the Four Noble Truths, where Rahula enumerated as the truth of dukkha, the truth of the cause f dukkha, the truth of eliminating dukkha and the truth of the right path. Dukkha is defined as the factors that affect your ways of reaching the highest quality of life.These are selfishness and desires which will be eliminated by following the right paths which is the eight fold path.
For Catholics, unity and holiness is believed to be achieved through apostolic preaching, for Buddhist, selfishness and desires that enables you to achieve the highest quality if self (holiness for catholics) is eliminated through eight-fold path.
