its been a while

Its been a while since my last post. The reason for the delay...its called a doctoral thesis. My apologies for the absence. I'm back.

Well, I successfully defended my dissertation a few weeks ago and now I am officially a PhD. But today, I want to write about today. The Dalai Lama visited Rice today and shares some of his thoughts. He is a cheerful old man who I am sure is a pleasure to hang out with. He wasn't as eloquent as I hoped, but overall, I enjoyed the opportunity to see him speak.

An interesting comment he made, which many may think odd for a religious man to made, concerned religion. He suggested that people should stick to the religion they were brought up with rather than convert to a religion that appeals to them. I think by this suggestion he was pointing out that organized religion is really more of a tradition. Your own spirituality is defined by much more than a title given to your faith. Spirituality is much much more than religion.

I like that. It also makes me think that respecting other people's religion is really about respecting their traditions, their upbringing, and their family. We live in a sad world when people hate and kill each other over religion.

Hmm, I'm not as eloquent as I thought I would be either...