{Religious Properties [continued (3)]}[6th December 1987]

[Redbook4:202-203][19871206:2355c]{Religious Properties [continued (3)]}[6th December 1987]

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[continued]

*I think that some Hindu ascetics, many Sufis, most Buddhists, and all Christian mystics would tend to agree that Religion is about the Inner life rather than the Outer World, even though its workings in the former may come to affect the latter. The religious life is lived primarily in the Spiritual Kingdom: the Material World is of secondary importance, and exists only to support the Inner life. To my mind, this is an essential validating sign of any religion.

The Jewish religion is, as the Pope said,** our elder brother, the primary origin of our own religious understanding. But elder brothers can be wrong.*** The Jews, of all people, should know that the Spiritual Kingdom can be entered independently of the Secular Realm.

Any religion which holds as a part of its doctrine the possession of a piece of the Material World must cast, to that extent, doubt upon its own validity.****

*[See last previous entry.]

**[During Pope John Paul II's discourse during his visit to the Rome Synagogue on 13 April 1986 (http://www.vatican.va/jubilee_2000/magazine/documents/ju_mag_01111997_p-42x_en.html), & in August 1987, in (?) a letter to Archbishop John L. May of St. Louis, president of the National Conference of Catholic Bishops, shortly before the Pope's visit to the United States (http://articles.latimes.com/1987-08-20/news/mn-3718_1_elder-brothers) – (for example?)]

***(I know – I am one.)

****So far as the Holocaust# is concerned: in a nutshell, it seems that Christians want to identify themselves with the Jews, but Jews want Christians to identify themselves with the Nazis. <880307>

#[See last previous entry but one, [Redbook4:200-203][19871206:2355]{Religious Properties}[6th December 1987].]

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