soul habit – Page 4

Notes from Pew study on how demographics are changing world religion

Expect to see more writing on religion and spirituality here. While crypto investment is still my current obsession, I’ve shifted that content over to Breaking Bitcoin and an email newsletter.

There is tremendous wisdom and value stored in the world’s major faiths. Huston Smiths calls them the great wisdom traditions and he’s not wrong. For me this interest snowballed with Alain de Botton’s Religion for Atheists book [Amazon]. Fwiw I don’t consider myself an atheist. Here are some of my blog posts about his book.

I hope in the future to join or launch a lifelong project to identify, collect, and share all of the world’s religious wisdom with all of the world’s people. And the best sort of wisdom is when you are not just reading but doing. Not only reading but practicing. I call this loosely the soul habit and have written briefly about it before. Let me know if this interests you.

The Pew Research Center regularly publishes valuable survey data and analyses on how religion is practiced and how it’s changing around the world. Here are my notes from a recent study on demographics. Here is the Pew analysis and full report.

NOTES

Islam will become the most populous religion in the world because, simply put, Muslims have more babies

In the period between 2010 and 2015, births to Muslims made up an estimated 31% of all babies born around the world – far exceeding the Muslim share of people of all ages in 2015 (24%).

As a group, nonbelievers and the unaffiliated will continue to decline as a percentage of the world population. This is driven primarily by people leaving Christianity. Other groups unable to keep pace with global population growth: Buddhism, Judaism, and folk religions

…the religiously unaffiliated population is heavily concentrated in places with aging populations and low fertility, such as China, Japan, Europe and North America.

Between 2015 and 2020, religious “nones” are projected to experience a net gain of 7.6 million people due to religious switching; people who grew up as Christians are expected to make up the overwhelming majority of those who switch into the unaffiliated group

The relative influence of Muslims is expected to increase in sub-Saharan African and decrease in Asia

By 2060, 27% of the global Muslim population is projected to be living in the region, up from 16% in 2015. By contrast, the share of Muslims living in the Asia-Pacific region is expected to decline over the period from 61% to 50%.

The youngest major religions are, in order, Islam, Hinduism, and Christianity

The median ages of Muslims (24 years) and Hindus (27) are younger than the median age of the world’s overall population (30), while the median age of Christians (30) matches the global median. All the other groups are older…

China is home to 61% of the world’s unaffiliated population as of 2015 (!)

Why life is a JUGGLING act not a balancing act

“I think it’s about juggling. The juggling metaphor is a lot more apt. One of the things about juggling is that you’ve got to keep your eye on all the balls. A second thing about juggling is each time you touch something you have to give it energy. You’ve got to throw it up in the air so that it takes care of itself while you’re working on the others. You’ve also got to throw the balls thoughtfully and carefully. That requires a lot of practice. The third thing about juggling, though, is you’ve got to catch the falling ball. The most important ball is the one that’s about to hit the ground.” – Howard Stevenson

From a meeting between Harvard’s divinity school and business school:

The 3 ways in which religion tries to meet our deepest needs

Ok, technically, Professor Roberto Unger calls them “the 3 religious orientations to the world”.

In his view, the major religious traditions fall into one of 3 groups. These groups have separate and distinct ways to understand our world and our individual and collective purposes within.

I came upon his theory in the below YouTube video and had the proverbial mind-blown moment (actually, moments, very plural) and was compelled to share:

I can only give a very simple, laymen’s description of his system, but I think you’ll find it fascinating.

The 3 orientations are:

1. Overcoming the world = Buddhism
2. Humanizing the world = Confucianism
3. Struggling with the world = Christianity

Or as I think of them:

Buddhism = Air (floats away, detaches, avoids)
Confucianism = Water (works around, negotiates, softens)
Christianity = Fire (changes, transforms, engages)

Buddhism teaches you to overcome the world. Buddha thinks the ultimate goal of a person’s life is to go beyond the world, to detach and remove yourself and rise above the suffering, the emotions, the vicissitudes of daily existence. Through this process you will reach nirvana. That’s why I compared Buddhism to air. It floats, it’s there, but you can hardly feel it.

Confucianism humanizes the world. What matters to Confucius is our society and its system of roles and responsibilities, created and maintained by us. There are 5 big roles in Confucian thinking: parent-child, older sibling-younger sibling, ruler-subject, husband-wife, and older friend-younger friend. What gives life purpose and meaning is to perform our given roles as well as we can. In a sense, life is a play, and our job is to know our character’s responsibilities and perform them well. That’s why I see Confucianism as water. It’s about flow and harmony and respect.

Christianity struggles with the world. Professor Unger believes this orientation (if not Christianity itself) will grow in prominence relative to the previous two. Struggling with the world is about effort, engagement, and conflict. It says, life can be better, but it is up to us to make it so. That’s why I see this orientation as fire: fire transforms, fire burns hot, fire can destroy a forest but in so doing can also nurture life and provide warmth and cook food.

So if we think about the world’s enduring religions, where do Hinduism, Islam, and Judaism fit in? I didn’t even know people saw Confucianism as a religion or a spiritual orientation, but I’m sure Professor Unger has a good answer to that. I should ask him…

PS. An update on the above question, straight from Unger’s book draft: The struggle with the world has spoken in two voices. One voice is sacred: that of the Semitic salvation religions—Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. The other voice is profane: that of the secular projects of liberation. These projects have included the political programs of liberalism, socialism, and democracy as well as the romantic movement, especially the global popular romantic culture, with its message of the godlike dignity of ordinary men and women and the unfathomable depth and reach of their experience.

The 10 principles you should follow, from the world’s oldest religion

upanishads-sitting-down-near

Ok, whether Hinduism is the world’s oldest surviving religion is debatable. But, like the question of whether Roger Federer is the tennis goat, it’s very much in the conversation.

The Upanishads lists 10 forbearances, essentially principles and activities that should be followed as sources of good karma and signs of virtue. They are:

Ahimsa – don’t do harm to any living being, human or other
Satya – always be truthful
Asteya – don’t covet another’s property
Brahmacharya – remain celibate while single, and stay faithful (broadly defined) in marriage
Daya – be kind, without conditions
Arjava – don’t deceive others
Kshama – always forgive
Dhriti – remain calm and modest in times of great wealth and poverty, whether of yourself or of others
Mitahara – eat, drink, and accumulate (money and belongings) in moderation
Saucha – clean the body and mind through both physical and spiritual actions

The suggestions pretty much boil down to this: think always of the Golden Rule, and apply it to others AND to yourself.

In just about every religion, you’ll see such lists, and you’ll see a LOT of similarities between them: Moses’s Ten Commandments. Jesus’s Sermon on the Mount and Sermon on the Plain. The Egyptian Book of the Dead. The Night Journey verses in the Qu’ran. And although I don’t remember such explicit directives in the Dao de Jing, you’ll find similar wisdom in Buddha’s Eightfold Path, in the Analects of Confucius…

Here are more interesting lists of knowledge and wisdom.

The majestic you versus the redemptive you (a story of two Adams)

Abreha_and_Atsbeha_Church_-_Adam_and_Eve_01 For Rabbi Joseph Soloveitchik, Adam is a very different and changed man between Genesis 1 and Genesis 2. He explains this idea in an essay called The Lonely Man of Faith. I came across the concept in a David Brooks lecture.

Genesis 1’s Adam is majestic while Genesis 2’s Adam is covenantal. Adam 1 transforms the world, and is master of his domain, whereas Adam 2 is redemptive and sacrifices a rib to gain a companion in Eve.

“Adam I is the external Adam, it’s the resume Adam,” Brooks explained. “Adam I wants to build, create, use, start things. Adam II is the internal Adam. Adam II wants to embody certain moral qualities, to have a serene inner character, not only to do good but to be good. To live and be is to transcend the truth and have an inner coherence of soul. Adam I, the resume Adam, wants to conquer the world…. Adam II wants to obey a calling and serve the world. Adam I asks how things work, Adam II asks why things exist and what ultimately we’re here for.”

Within each of us are an Adam 1 and an Adam 2 fighting to control our personality, our decisions, our future.

Our Adam 1 wants more and greater, and our Adam 2 wishes to enjoy what we already possess.

Our Adam 1 wants to win, but Adam 2 doesn’t want life to be a competition.

Our Adam 1 wants to do things his way, no matter the cost. Our Adam 2 wishes to work in a team, to compromise and enjoy success together

“I think we mean that [Adam 2] is capable of experiencing large and sonorous emotions, they have a profound spiritual presence,” Brooks said. “In the realm of emotion they have a web of unconditional love. In the realm of intellect, they have a set, permanent philosophy about how life is. In the realm of action, they have commitments to projects that can’t be completed in a lifetime. In the realm of morality, they have a certain consistency and rigor that’s almost perfect.”

Thanks to Uri Friedman at The Atlantic for the above quotes.