I have a soft spot for the topic of people who are dual faith. It’s weird, you know. If you’re an atheist, you get a thumbs up from me. If you’re religious with one faith, you get a raised eyebrow from me. And if you are dual faith, you get two thumbs up from me. It just feels like you’re more open-minded if you are more than one faith.

  • Norin@lemmy.world
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    4 days ago

    Hi there. I teach World Religions (and other philosophy classes), so this is my area of expertise.

    Some religious traditions are more open to being practiced along side other traditions, while some have beliefs that demand exclusivity.

    In Hinduism, for example, there are millions of gods… all of which are a part of the Supreme God. This logic can, and has, been extended to the gods of other religions.

    Likewise, some religions pair together quite nicely, like Buddhism and Shinto or Taoism and Confucianism.

    There are also ways in which some religions might have some common ground. You can apply some Buddhist ideas within your Christianity, depending on what those Buddhist ideas are. On this, see Thomas Merton’s work on Zen, or DT Suzuki’s work on Christianity.

    As to practicing multiple faiths being a sign of maturity… I think it’s more that friendliness to ideas outside your comfort zone is the mark of maturity here. This can include atheism too. Someone who genuinely wants to understand other perspectives is going to walk away with at least a few ideas they can affirm.

  • PeteWheeler@lemmy.world
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    3 days ago

    Seems pretty stupid when most faiths core ‘truth’ is that they are the only true faith.

    So you are someone who wants a reason to explain your behavior to others, with no real conviction or faith. If you have dual faith, it actually means no faith, just an excuse for your shitty behavior.

    • ShiverMeTimbers@lemm.eeOP
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      3 days ago

      What if no behavior is entailed and it’s just someone mentioning they have dual faith?

    • ShiverMeTimbers@lemm.eeOP
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      3 days ago

      Worship of Trump baffles me. Said worship isn’t even consistent. One moment he’s the second coming of Cyrus the Great, another moment he’s the second coming of George Washington, and another moment he’s the second coming of Jesus himself. At this point, they might as well just max it out by acknowledging he’s the latest Avatar, the sixteenth doctor, the latest vessel of Professor Ozpin, and the most infamous and most anime-named Lemmy mod all wrapped up into one and be done with it.

      On a slightly more serious but lighthearted note, it does invoke the question “what counts as a religion?”

  • Call me Lenny/Leni@lemm.ee
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    4 days ago

    I have been described this way before, even though I see what I am as one whole. You could even call it “trial faith” if you count “agnosticism” as a component. I say that because I don’t think of myself as metaphysically focused. Sure, God may exist, and I do have those leanings, but metaphysical matters are, by virtue of their nature, left out of the strict equations of life, by definition. I see my specifications with God as being summed up with “for all intents and purposes” (as much as people tend to mock it, Jordan Peterson’s “what is” speech comes to mind here).

    This may be my Pacific Islander side showing, but adherence to “folk LDS” has to do with the first part of my alignment. It has often been called Hagothism. In the Book of Mormon, one might recall (or so I am told) there are a few random verses where a sailor named Hagoth goes to different places in the Pacific to spread the light of the Nephites. This is where the tradition would come in. There are those of us who hold all the main teachings of “Mormons” (who don’t really like being called that) but who teach something that’s Australianized instead of Americanized. So different story narrative and whatnot. “Hagothists” still, however, identify as LDS. You can be a “Mormon” but not a “Hagothist” and vice versa, though even “Mormons” who have been to places relevant to “Hagothism” have seen the signs possibly indicative of being visited by the lord, such as stories in native beliefs about heavenly visitors. Though I am not absolute, I definitely lean towards these teachings known as Hagothism, it’s not as judgmental and best matches expectations and answers questions.

    Along comes the Mune Shinri, a scripture whose “faith name” is “Aiken”. I only had to read it once, and everything fits perfectly. Components such as the views on gods (technically henotheism but technically monotheism, one doesn’t rule out other gods while the other is like “hey, the angels of old were gods in a way”), the views on the afterlife (Hell is not for the good-hearted; one says you have to try really hard to get into Hell, the other speaks of a man named Akuma who was the first to do just that and resides in a place where people who haven’t repented serious things stay given they don’t speak their heart out), the views on geography (Aiken’s connection to Japan comes to mind, and a lot of people wonder how Japan fits in with the lore about Hagoth, which may have an answer here), and the views on human rights (both are LGBT-friendly for example, err, one suggests it’s not God’s plan but implies it isn’t damnable while the other says he does not look down on any form of unity) all come together like a rope and a curtain. As many of us do with many things, I, at different times, may vocally identify differently and with different semantics, even though it’s all there at all times. As for what church I go to, it’s a mix between a non-specifically denominational group and a regular LDS one.

    • ShiverMeTimbers@lemm.eeOP
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      3 days ago

      I wouldn’t really count agnosticism, no. Faith is relative. Even CS Lewis, the leader of the apologetics movement, expressed a “we really don’t know in the end” in his final chapter of his final book. One might say everyone has varying degrees of agnosticism. So you’re like me then, where my basis for honoring spirituality is that it’s better to thank a creator that’s not there than end up not thanking a creator that ends up being there?