[Buddha-l] the existence of God in Buddhism

[Richard Hayes]

On Thursday 24 August 2006 01:50, Erik Hoogcarspel wrote:

> Thank you for this splendid example of a vicious circle and academic
> stupidity. The term 'secular religon' is a contradictio in termine, like
> 'square circle'.

That's not quite true. The first use of the term "secular" was to refer to 
priests who tended to the needs of parishioners, as opposed to cloistered 
monks. Even in contemporary terminology, a secular priest is one who performs 
various religious rituals and has pastoral duties, as opposed to someone who 
lives a cloistered life. In English, a religious is anyone who takes vows. 
Since priests take vows, a secular priest is a secular religious. No 
contradiction in terms to be found anywhere.

You may persist in thinking that "secular religious" is stupidity of some 
sort, but if it stupidity at all it is not academic stupidity. It is, if 
anything, secular religious stupidity.

-- 
Richard P. Hayes
Department of Philosophy
University of New Mexico
http://www.unm.edu/~rhayes