A local journalist called and asked me “ What would you do, Ajahn Brahm, if someone took a Buddhist Holy Book and flushed it down the toilet?”
Without hesitation I answered “Sir, if someone took a Buddhist Holy Book and flushed it down the toilet, the first thing I would do is call a plumber!”
When the journalist finished laughing, he confided in me that that was the most sensible answer he had heard.
Source | Ajahn Brahm, Good? Bad? Who Knows?
CONSIDER THIS
You may flush a Holy Book down a toilet, but you will never flush forgiveness, peace and compassion – traits and characteristics that healthy religions, faith traditions and philosophies of life are made of – down a toilet.
Remember that the book is never the religion, nor is the statue, the building or the priest. These are only “containers.”
What does the book teach us? What does the statue represent? What qualities are the priests supposed to embody? This is the “content”.
When we recognize the difference between the container and the contents, then we will preserve the contents even when the container is being destroyed.
We can print more books, build more temples and statues and even train more monks and nuns, but when we lose our love and respect for others and ourselves and replace it with violence, then the whole religion has gone down the toilet.
Source unknown: We have enough religion to make us hate, but not enough religion to make us love.
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“We have just enough religion to hate one another, but not enough to make us love one another.” I recall reading this quote at St Patrick’s Cathedral, Dublin, where Jonathan Swift was dean. It is found in Jonathan Swift’s , Thoughts on Various Subjects from Miscellanies (1711-1726)
You can see another reference to it on my blog at http://www.philipchircop.com
http://www.philipchircop.com/post/88647154337/jonathan-swift-during-a-visit-to-saint-patricks
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