Religious Resurgence

[Guest guest]

Dear All,

 

Karen Armstrong, speaking about the appearance of all the great world religions

in the first 'New Axial Age', which was a time of upheaval very similar to our

own present age, states:

 

" Most significantly, it is the time when all the great

world religions came into being. And in every single case, the

spiritualities that emerged during the Axial Age—Taoism and

Confucianism in China, monotheism in Israel, Hinduism, Buddhism, and

Jainism in India, and Greek rationalism in Europe—began with a recoil

from violence, with looking into the heart to find the sources of

violence in the human psyche. The conviction that the world was awry

was fundamental to these spiritualities. One of the things that is

very striking is that all the great sages were living in a time like

our own—a time full of fear, violence, and horror. Their experience

of utter impotence in a cruel world impelled them to seek the highest

goals and an absolute reality in the depths of their beings. "

 

America's blind greed for money in this modern age has already set the stage

upon which America is currently reaping the ongoing destruction of family

values, increased violence, deep anxiety, heartache and despair.

 

China's damaging focus on its one-child policy together with the country's

rampant consumerism and 'carefree morality' has also resulted in alarming

societal concerns.

 

To deal with such potent world challenges, Karen Armstrong observes that: " At

this moment in history, I believe that we need a new spiritual revolution. We

need a new faith. Now, you can say, " Look, give us a break. This is hardly the

time to start a new spiritual revolution. At this juncture, we've got war. We've

got the prospect of terrorism. The economy is bad. Let's have a bit of peace and

quiet so that we can go up a mountain, collect ourselves, and then begin this

spiritual effort. " But suffering, fear, violence, and despair are the prime

conditions for such a renewal.

 

A New Axial Age

Karen Armstrong on the History—and the Future—of God

by Jessica Roemischer

http://www.enlightennext.org/magazine/j31/armstrong.asp?page=1

 

Indeed, the Chinese government is 'clearly turning to the country's traditional

religions in order to revive old sources of value,' and

although there is a glimmer of a 'religious resurgence' in China today, America

also needs, above all, to pursue the inward spiritual journey. Shri Mataji

Nirmala Devi promises:

 

" ..if their [America's] desire for money is dissolved, automatically as a

by-product their desire for their Spirit will increase. They will respect their

families and love their children and old parents and if America works out, the

rest of the world will follow. "

 

" Ye must be born again! " - is the message given for all humanity. The whole

world is invited to seek the Eternal, to desire their Spirit, to receive the

gift of Second Birth in this Resurrection Time. Shri Mataji Nirmala Devi, the

Holy Spirit has come.

 

Shri Mataji's promise in Aug/Sept 2008 (sent by Madhuri, while in Italy at

Cabella castle, witnessing Shri Mataji's words on America)

 

/message/10501

 

 

 

 

The faithful come out

China is experiencing a religious resurgence and, remarkably, the government is

letting it happen

 

Mark Vernon

guardian.co.uk, Wednesday 28 January 2009 09.00 GMT

Article history

If you walk down Battery Path in central Hong Kong you are likely to see a

silent protest on one side of the pavement. Two or three demonstrators sit,

cross-legged on the ground, in meditation. Next to them, on boards, are

displayed the hideous images of individuals who have been beaten and presumably

tortured. Passing parents shield the eyes of their children.

 

These are supporters of Falun Gong, the religious movement founded in the 1990s.

It is distinguished by being probably the highest profile victim of the Chinese

government's fear of organised religion. A clampdown began after a peaceful

protest in July 1999 in Tiananmen Square when Falun Gong was outlawed. According

to Amnesty International, the government then launched " a long-term campaign of

intimidation and persecution, directed by a special organisation called the 610

Office. " Protests are allowed in Hong Kong, just yards away from government

offices, because of the status of the Special Administrative Region.

 

It is a clear reminder of the dark side of the Chinese authority's approach to

religion. However, it is not the whole story.

 

Martin Palmer is the secretary-general of the Alliance of Religions and

Conservation (ARC). He runs one of the few organisations that have a license

from the Chinese government to work with religious groups in the country. He can

hardly stress enough how profound the changes now taking place are. So are they

a sign of a more relaxed attitude towards freedom of religious expression?

 

About three years ago, he was approached to make contact with Taoists. This

followed similar suggestions about working with Buddhists, three years before

that. These invitations struck Palmer as odd, to say the least. After all, this

is a regime that had tried to wipe out Taoism, destroying about 98% of its

temples, statues and scriptures.

 

However, reforms have continued apace. Just last year, in 2008, several public

holidays were reformed, again indicative of development. The May Day holiday,

symbolic for any socialist, was downgraded and in its place two others were

revived. One is the Qing Ming, or Festival of the Dead, on which Chinese people

remember their ancestors. A second is the Dragon Boat Festival, which partly

commemorates a famous mandarin who warned an emperor against corruption. The

significance of that story will not be lost on the Chinese people.

 

Palmer believes that three factors have come together to make the Chinese

government reconsider its attitude towards religion. The first is the

consequences of the one-child policy. " It's the biggest single sociological

change in China since what we think of as China was created, " he says. " It

completely undermines the notion of the family and the clan. " In short, it

encourages people to disregard the elders and focus all their hopes and

aspirations on the one child.

 

As any parent might realise, single-minded devotion of that sort does not make

for ideal child-rearing. In China, people talk of creating a generation of

" little emperors and empresses " , and they're not using terms of endearment.

 

The second factor is untramelled consumerism, the free market policies that are

creating a generation raised on greed. " Chinese culture has always previously

recognised an underpinning ideology, " Palmer explains, referring to

Confucianism, republicanism and most recently communism. " They may have been

honoured in the breach as much as in observance, but now it is recognised that

the country has a problem " – namely, how to nurture a sense of society, care and

ethics.

 

That links in with the third issue, which Palmer calls " the almost complete

collapse in communism " . He reports how officials, wearing communist insignia,

have told him to ignore the word: they really work for the " Chinese party " not

the " Communist party " , they say. This is no bad thing, of course. In relation to

religion, it has led to a relaxing of the rules so that it is now possible to be

a member of the party and have a registered religious affiliation. To date,

about 40% of party members have " come out " as religious as a result.

 

All in all, the government is clearly turning to the country's traditional

religions in order to revive old sources of value.

 

No doubt it is partly a cynical move. If religion is the " heart of a heartless

world " , to recall Marx, it can also be used as an opiate for the people. A

little religious commitment might help to mitigate the social unrest that a

growing gap between rich and poor can bring. It is this kind of strife that the

authorities fear more than anything. Falun Gong's problem is that it is

perceived as exacerbating such discord, not calming it. It sounds paranoid, but

the received wisdom in China is that every past regime has been weakened by a

religious uprising that eventually led to the regime being overthrown. Falun

Gong is the unfortunate heir of that myth. It fits the bill because it is, in

part, an apocalyptic movement.

 

But more widely, religion is resurgent in an extraordinary way in modern China.

Whether it can turn the tide of carefree morality, characteristic of the new

capitalism, is another question entirely.

 

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/jan/28/religion-china-falun-taoism