Friday, April 09, 2010

The Buddha (and Christian Answers)

An interesting documentary on PBS about Siddartha Gautama and his teaching (i.e. Buddhism).

As one growing up in a so-called Christian nation, I wonder how to reconcile The Buddha and Jesus Christ. Google turned up Christian Answers, a website defending Christianity (not sure exactly what branch - it says nondemominational). Of interest to me were searches on Buddha, Jehovah's Witness, Mormonism, science. More: Deepak Chopra, Catholics, Muslims, Christian Science, Scientology, Taoism, ecumenical (which brought up a page on mysticism). Ah, here's their top ten cults.

They even have movie reviews! I just happened to see Robert Klein as one of the search terms. Which led to Two Weeks Notice. Then off the top of my head. The Matrix. Star Wars. Harry Potter.

Evolution. Global Warming. Barack Obama (which only brought up the movies: Capitalism: A Love Story and W). Which leads to Michael Moore. And Bill Maher's Religulous. A search of Pat Robertson brings up Harry Potter again. And also the movie For The Bible Tells Me So. And on and on. Nothing on my favorite movie Oh God! A search on Heaven Can Wait brings up Just Like Heaven which has a moral rating of offensive (though the reviewer liked it and every comment was positive except for one).

Lots of movie reviews.

More rambling. Nothing much on Family Guy. Or South Park. A search for Team America (possibly the most objectionable movie I have ever seen) curiously brought up Kung Fu Hustle.

More on the website. The executive director is Paul S. Taylor who somehow has a special interest on dinosaurs and the bible. The president is Dr. Lowell Wallen. I can't find much on Dr. Wallen which means he's not controversial.

All in all, I'd have to say the website is a sincere, admirable effort.

Ah, apparently they are evangelicals, because a search on evangelicals brings up AIIA Institute hosted on their site which states The AIIA Statement of Faith is the same as that of the National Association of Evangelicals (NAE). So I don't know if you can really call them "nondemonational".

[10/29/14] The Life of Buddha (BBC documentary)

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