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This is a post I've been meaning to do for quite some time. It will be deeply personal, important, educational, and maybe a bit enlightening.
This is about me and my faith/religion. If you don't like that kind of subject, please scroll past and ignore this; this is not the post to mock me on or to try converting me, though I doubt any of you really would do such. However, I suggest you try to read it anyways. It might explain some things about me and a faith many know next to nothing about, if they even have heard of it.
People throughout my life since I converted have been asking me a myriad of things about me and my faith, ranging from really good points to amazingly stupid thoughts. I hope to cover a broad range with this. If you have anything to ask not covered here, please go for it, but I ask you do so politely.
I guess the only way to start this off is by saying hello, everyone, my name is Atma/Amanda, and I am devoutly Shinto, leaning more towards the Koshinto side of things.
Let's start off with the most basic question.
What is Shinto?
Shinto is a polytheistic religion native to Japan that has roots dating as far back as the Jōmon period, which lasted roughly from 14,000 - 300BC though stories and practices were not solidly put down until the writings of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki in the 8th century AD. They're books that serve as both storybooks and historical records, and about the closest the faith comes to having a holy book. Shinto has evolved throughout its entire history and now includes some influence from other Eastern faiths, mostly Buddhism. Its also rooted heavily in shamanism and animism.
The word Shinto itself means "Way of the Kami" or "Way of the Gods." It's one of the only religions I can think of that has a matriarchal center god-figure in it, too. It also has no grand End of Days myth or apocalypses or doomsday prophecies.
What are the core tenets of Shinto?
1.) Respect your family/ancestors (Imported aspect from Buddhism and Koshinto)
2.) Respect nature in all its forms, both awesome and scary
3.) Wash your stank ass/stay pure and clean physically and spiritually
4.) Everything in nature/the world possesses a kami and they should be venerated
5.) Festivals own because you can drink a lot of sake, which is purifying and holy, and you should totally share some and your snack with the kami
What is Koshinto?
Ancient Shinto. The faith as it was when it started off in the Jomon period before anything else influenced it. Still practiced by the Ainu and the Ryukyuan peoples. It's a lot more basic and was quite a bit shamanistic, with lady shamans being much more important than guy shamans.
What are the core tenets of Koshinto?
1.) Respect your ancestors
2.) Respect nature in all its forms, both awesome and scary
3.) Wash your stank ass/stay pure and clean physically and spiritually
4.) Nature is really cool and everything has a kami in it, nature itself has one, worship and respect it by celebrating life in oneself because nature gave you your life and you are a part of it
5.) Death is part of life and nature and means to simply change form into these kami
6.) Pottery is cool.
As you can see, not much is changed, but there are some differences such as the fact kami are not represented as tangible figures and how to go about purifying yourself. Koshinto relied on waterfall meditation and water splashing and chanting whereas Shinto sticks to just splashing water on you and has more traditionally godly/Buddhist-like kami figures.
What are Kami?
This is a tough thing to cover. The translation most used is god, though they're not all gods. All gods are kami, but not all kami are gods. They're more akin to awesome spirits that are found in everything from trees, to rivers, to gods, to heroes, to pandemic diseases. An Edo period scholar named Motoori Norinaga puts it best.
"[A kami is] any thing or phenomenon that produces the emotions of fear and awe, with no distinction between good and evil."
So basically there's a fuckload of them but the nice thing about Shinto is I don't have to keep track of all of them and can pick and choose which ones I directly worship and work under. It should also be noted neither Shinto or Koshinto have a real homogenity to belief like a lot of faiths do and belief and practice are very much individual and personal and welcome individual interpretations of tradition and tenets. There's no wrong way to pray!
Kami that act like gods in the familiar sense are actually very flawed beings, akin to Greek or Norse gods. They're about as human as any of us.
So you're a bunch of drunk tree-huggers? / I thought Shinto was invented during WW2 to be used as Jingoistic war recruiting propaganda? / You bombed Pearl Harbor, didn't you? / You're a fucking Japanophile aren't you? / Rrrr, I mad!
This covers all of the very scant few negative stereotypes I've had flung at me, beyond the generic anti-theist bullcrap about how I'm destroying science and logic and the typical fundamentalist bullcrap about how I'm gonna go to (bad afterlife) because I'm not of their faith and won't convert. They're all dumb as fuck and rooted in a lot of Western patriotism and racism, or just good old fashioned ignorance and othering.
Except the part about me being a drunk tree-hugger because that is totally true.
How do you reconcile being gay/genderqueer with being religious?
This is probably one of the best questions I've been asked, given as it's such a hot topic right now, with how people of Abrahamic faiths use their teachings often to deny GLBT people rights and happiness.
The thing is I don't have to. Shinto has no record or law against any form of sexuality or gender. There is historical evidence of artwork depicting gods in homosexual acts and revering a few of them as the patron deities of such things, which seem to have been quietly not brought up much nowadays, but homophobia in Japan is largely secular. You will find no reason or rhyme for it in Shinto itself.
Most of it is of men with men, but there is record of women with women, although much rarer. This is not a problem with Shinto so much as it is most of the world has not bothered recording historical lesbianism in faith or the secular world, but that's misogyny best discussed for another time.
There are stories of a lot of kami that cross the barriers of gender and are considered transgender on various levels. Some like Inari are depicted as a woman, a man, and an androgynous figure. Inari has a wife, Uke Mochi, making them possibly bisexual as well as trans. Inari is also the patron deity of kitsune, which are cruel trickster foxes that disguise themselves as women to seduce men, regardless of if the fox is male or not. It's all so complicated by fascinating.
Homosexuality itself was brought into our world by Shinu No Hafuri and Ama No Hafuri, who were possible servants of Amaterasu. Shinu died and Ama was so overcome with grief, they killed themselves and were buried alongside Shinu. So basically it's like any other tragic love story that was a popular genre of the era. Amaterasu herself is depicted as bi/pansexual, and she's the central godfigure, so when the head honcho is queer, it's kind of hard to find religious fault for any hatred. If anyone tries to justify their phobias using Shinto, it'd be the most hilariously inept thing ever.
So there's no reason for me to loathe myself or try to justify my faith with my sexuality when there is no issue to begin with, nor is there need to create one. And even if there was issue with it, I see no reason for me not to start my own sect and interpret the teachings as I will and change behavior and views form within my own faith. Remember, Shinto encourages individual belief, so this wouldn't be too big of a problem. Queer Theology is also a viable educational path now, and wouldn't require much if at all for Shinto anyways, if I ever needed it.
What about other hot-button issues like abortion or medicine or science?
Abortion is accepted quite so and is secular in Japan. There is nothing in Shinto about it.
There is nothing against medicine/science/using nature to help. I am not holding any progress back. People like anti-vaccers and BEEP BOOP USE ONLY LOGIC are the worst.
And for the record, masturbation isn't a sin, either. Hell, some of the only major sins are incest and bestiality, and even then destroying crops is seen as a worse crime. Just wash yourself after you fap or sin, would you? Be sanitary with your sister-fucking, gosh.
So who do you choose to worship/venerate?
I have a few kami I'm particularly fond of.
Amaterasu-ōmikami - Hey this may be like one of the only names/words some of you will recognize. Amaterasu is the goddess of the sun and our universe and the central god figure of the faith. She was born of her father Izanagi-no-Mikoto's left eye after he stopped to bath the filth from Yomi (land of the dead) off of him as he tried to retrieve his wife Izanami-no-Mikoto from it. She's vain and a big foodie and somewhat of a perv, but she's still our mother figure and she who brings us warmth and light. She's the goddess from whom the royal family of Japan is descended from.
How big of a foodie is she? The main shrine that houses her, the Shrine at Ise, offers her a ton of food twice every day. Most festivals/matsuri include a lot of booze and food. She also vanquished her twin brother, the moon god Tsukuyomi, to forever only rule the night and be separate from her, calling him evil, for the mere act of killing the food goddess Uke Mochi. He was disgusted by how she served it (coughing up rice, spitting up fish, and crapping out game animals) and just up and killed her, her body becoming rice, millet, beans, and silkworms. Don't fuck with Amaterasu's food.
The vanity and her being a pervert come form the same tale. Amaterasu's other brother, the storm god Susano-o, and her got into a fight (some family) and she hid in a cave and the sun stopped rising. How did they lure her out? The goddess of mirth and dawn and revelry, Ame No Uzume, came out and did a dance exposing her vagina and breasts, offering Amaterasu to come look. She did. With gusto. While admiring herself in a mirror. While she was distracted by boobs, they sealed the cave off.
You all probably know her form the video game Okami where she was a wolf who peed on everything. The game itself isn't 100% accurate to Shinto but the core tenets and the personality of the kami are still spot on. You probably noticed how much she ate and how much she liked to stare at boobs, amongst other things.
She's a good woman and I'm glad to work under her. May her golden rays shine down on us, guide us, and warm us forevermore.
Hachiman - AKA Hachiman-jin and Yahata-no-kami. Kami of warriors and samurai. His symbol is the mitsudomoe, which is a pattern you've probably seen a lot. I want to get one tattooed on my right shoulder somewhere, someday. Kind of hard for me not to have a war or warrior god in my personal pantheon, what with my role in life being a protector and how much emphasis I place on my ability to be reliable and strong. Also a figure in Buddhism.
Benzaiten - AKA Ichikishima-hime-no-mikoto, Benten-dō, and Saraswati. Indian deity imported to Japan and added to Buddhist and Shinto worship. Goddess of things that flow, like water, words, knowledge, speech, music, and eloquence. Being a writer, I need to call upon that now and again.
I've called upon others before, but these are the central three, with Amaterasu being the most important to me.
Hey, you're largely nocturnal, why are you worshiping a sun goddess? How does that even work?
I can say as she rises and make sure she gets up safely before I go to sleep.
That and someone has to make sure Tsukuyomi isn't doing anything stupid like killing more food gods out of some insane need to sanitize everything with too much Lysol. I'm Amaterasu's night guard.
That and it's not like gods don't have call forwarding when it comes to prayer or anything. They're not that inept.
What else do you believe out of all this?
I'm quite heavily into respecting nature and the kami. This is where I am definitely more Koshinto in tradition. How individual/personal I am about faith in general and how I'd like to be a good female role model/influence/shaman also reflect my Koshinto nature. I'm naturally quite shamanistic and animistic and always have been, even before I adhered to any faith. I've also always been big on keeping Earth nice. I find as I get older, I become more and more Koshinto, though I think some more modern Shinto roots will always stick in me.
I'm not too big on the respecting family if only because my family has a lot of issues I deem them unworthy of such things like being praised in faith, but I will respect anyone worthy of it, ancestor or living or elder or younger, if I feel they should be. Also I have some stupid ancestors I rather feel the need to apologize for rather than venerate, like Sylvester Graham. I am so sorry, you guys.
I need to work harder on the staying physically clean, but I definitely got the booze and food part down.
I revere the kami well, and always keep Amaterasu in my thoughts. I believe everyone is her child, or at least somehow related (the kami and humans fucked a lot way back when, we're all bound to be related to some kami) and that since her golden rays touch and warm all and discriminate against none, neither shall I. Shinto is for everyone she can reach, and doesn't just belong to cranky old men in Japan.
I believe everyone has a right to believe in whatever belief or non-belief system they want. The second you try to convert or condemn is when you cross the line. I don't want to be converted nor can I be such, and I know not to do this to others. It's disgusting and cruel. Knock that shit off. Your rights end where mine begin, and vice-versa. Nobody is a coward or immature or stupid for believing any one way, unless they're being a jackhole about it.
I believe there exists a chance, should it ever become provable god(s) exist or not, that my way could be incorrect, and I will accept that. I believe there exists a chance I could be right. There exists a chance all of us could be right all at once and what the individual believes is what shapes creation and afterlife for them. There exists a chance we all could be wrong. There exists a chance that, should any of us figure this all out, the universe will change what the answer is just to fuck with us. There exists a chance that's already happened, possibly multiple times. So why fight over it? There are no absolutes beyond what you know for you.
I also believe in existentialism, bushido, and chivalry.
Hey, your girlfriend is atheist! You're ruining her with your stupid sky wizards! / She's ruining you with her cold science!
Not our fault we see science and religion as two sides of the same coin and not mortal enemies. I'm sorry you can't reconcile the fact two people of two different beliefs use it to compliment each other and give each other interesting points of view rather than use it as an excuse to kill each other. Theology and philosophy are sexy. Do you think if I fuck an atheist girl she explodes or something?
Also science =/= atheism you need to sit down.
How did you come to know about Shinto and convert?
There's actually no grand story here. We were studying world religions for history class in high school, I think 10th grade, and I got to Eastern faiths and found a book on Shinto. I realized that it was what I was already following based on my own morals my whole life; I wasn't raised to be any particular faith and had been rather agnostic until then. It was like finding out what I already was and that it had a name. It just made sense. So here we are.
I've since come to love it and its diverse mythos and way of life. it really is a great religion full of amazing little things.
What would you like to do with your faith?
I've been told I'd be good at writing theology papers/essays on the subject of Shinto/Koshinto and modern reflections of it and maybe rewriting/sorting out the myths.
I've also been told I could be a good theological mediator regarding belief and nonbelief in general and perhaps bridge some gaps of hatred and misunderstanding, lest we all tear each other apart. This can be achieved through open discussion and more papers/essays.
Someday, if I have the money, I'd like to build and open a shrine in the north Bay Area here in California where I live and offer it as sanctuary to everyone regardless of what they believe and have it be inclusive and a place people can go to study or debate. Attaching a brewery or small restaurant to it would be really cool, too, adding in my love of cooking.
Until then, all I can do is be like a wandering monk type, spreading good will and educating people where and when I can. The internet just makes this easier. Focusing on my martial arts and meditating helps and acts as a subset of my faith almost and makes me feel closer to them; a lot of the philosophy of things like Bushido is heavily Shinto based, after all. I can act as sanctuary and confidant all on my own for now.
If you weren't Shinto, what would you be?
Definitely something polytheistic. Maybe revive some Greek or Norse ways. Anything with a shamanism influence. Perhaps Hindu. The only Abrahamic path I could see myself following is Gnosticism.
I don't think I could envision myself without religion, no matter how many struggles I've had with it in life. Why? I don't know. It just is. It's a part of me, and I've come to accept it and embrace it.
Can I ever come to you about crisis of faith or just to talk religion or debate? / Can I ask you more about Shinto?
Always. Just remember respect is key.
Any sites you can recommend for Shinto?
Besides Wikipedia, I find this encyclopedia to be of immense use.
I also like the Shrine of Ise site, if only so I can keep track of any festivals I should pay attention to.
Also, for fun, look up Hounen Matsuri.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go contemplate rocks while drinking.
This is about me and my faith/religion. If you don't like that kind of subject, please scroll past and ignore this; this is not the post to mock me on or to try converting me, though I doubt any of you really would do such. However, I suggest you try to read it anyways. It might explain some things about me and a faith many know next to nothing about, if they even have heard of it.
People throughout my life since I converted have been asking me a myriad of things about me and my faith, ranging from really good points to amazingly stupid thoughts. I hope to cover a broad range with this. If you have anything to ask not covered here, please go for it, but I ask you do so politely.
I guess the only way to start this off is by saying hello, everyone, my name is Atma/Amanda, and I am devoutly Shinto, leaning more towards the Koshinto side of things.
Let's start off with the most basic question.
What is Shinto?
Shinto is a polytheistic religion native to Japan that has roots dating as far back as the Jōmon period, which lasted roughly from 14,000 - 300BC though stories and practices were not solidly put down until the writings of the Kojiki and Nihon Shoki in the 8th century AD. They're books that serve as both storybooks and historical records, and about the closest the faith comes to having a holy book. Shinto has evolved throughout its entire history and now includes some influence from other Eastern faiths, mostly Buddhism. Its also rooted heavily in shamanism and animism.
The word Shinto itself means "Way of the Kami" or "Way of the Gods." It's one of the only religions I can think of that has a matriarchal center god-figure in it, too. It also has no grand End of Days myth or apocalypses or doomsday prophecies.
What are the core tenets of Shinto?
1.) Respect your family/ancestors (Imported aspect from Buddhism and Koshinto)
2.) Respect nature in all its forms, both awesome and scary
3.) Wash your stank ass/stay pure and clean physically and spiritually
4.) Everything in nature/the world possesses a kami and they should be venerated
5.) Festivals own because you can drink a lot of sake, which is purifying and holy, and you should totally share some and your snack with the kami
What is Koshinto?
Ancient Shinto. The faith as it was when it started off in the Jomon period before anything else influenced it. Still practiced by the Ainu and the Ryukyuan peoples. It's a lot more basic and was quite a bit shamanistic, with lady shamans being much more important than guy shamans.
What are the core tenets of Koshinto?
1.) Respect your ancestors
2.) Respect nature in all its forms, both awesome and scary
3.) Wash your stank ass/stay pure and clean physically and spiritually
4.) Nature is really cool and everything has a kami in it, nature itself has one, worship and respect it by celebrating life in oneself because nature gave you your life and you are a part of it
5.) Death is part of life and nature and means to simply change form into these kami
6.) Pottery is cool.
As you can see, not much is changed, but there are some differences such as the fact kami are not represented as tangible figures and how to go about purifying yourself. Koshinto relied on waterfall meditation and water splashing and chanting whereas Shinto sticks to just splashing water on you and has more traditionally godly/Buddhist-like kami figures.
What are Kami?
This is a tough thing to cover. The translation most used is god, though they're not all gods. All gods are kami, but not all kami are gods. They're more akin to awesome spirits that are found in everything from trees, to rivers, to gods, to heroes, to pandemic diseases. An Edo period scholar named Motoori Norinaga puts it best.
"[A kami is] any thing or phenomenon that produces the emotions of fear and awe, with no distinction between good and evil."
So basically there's a fuckload of them but the nice thing about Shinto is I don't have to keep track of all of them and can pick and choose which ones I directly worship and work under. It should also be noted neither Shinto or Koshinto have a real homogenity to belief like a lot of faiths do and belief and practice are very much individual and personal and welcome individual interpretations of tradition and tenets. There's no wrong way to pray!
Kami that act like gods in the familiar sense are actually very flawed beings, akin to Greek or Norse gods. They're about as human as any of us.
So you're a bunch of drunk tree-huggers? / I thought Shinto was invented during WW2 to be used as Jingoistic war recruiting propaganda? / You bombed Pearl Harbor, didn't you? / You're a fucking Japanophile aren't you? / Rrrr, I mad!
This covers all of the very scant few negative stereotypes I've had flung at me, beyond the generic anti-theist bullcrap about how I'm destroying science and logic and the typical fundamentalist bullcrap about how I'm gonna go to (bad afterlife) because I'm not of their faith and won't convert. They're all dumb as fuck and rooted in a lot of Western patriotism and racism, or just good old fashioned ignorance and othering.
Except the part about me being a drunk tree-hugger because that is totally true.
How do you reconcile being gay/genderqueer with being religious?
This is probably one of the best questions I've been asked, given as it's such a hot topic right now, with how people of Abrahamic faiths use their teachings often to deny GLBT people rights and happiness.
The thing is I don't have to. Shinto has no record or law against any form of sexuality or gender. There is historical evidence of artwork depicting gods in homosexual acts and revering a few of them as the patron deities of such things, which seem to have been quietly not brought up much nowadays, but homophobia in Japan is largely secular. You will find no reason or rhyme for it in Shinto itself.
Most of it is of men with men, but there is record of women with women, although much rarer. This is not a problem with Shinto so much as it is most of the world has not bothered recording historical lesbianism in faith or the secular world, but that's misogyny best discussed for another time.
There are stories of a lot of kami that cross the barriers of gender and are considered transgender on various levels. Some like Inari are depicted as a woman, a man, and an androgynous figure. Inari has a wife, Uke Mochi, making them possibly bisexual as well as trans. Inari is also the patron deity of kitsune, which are cruel trickster foxes that disguise themselves as women to seduce men, regardless of if the fox is male or not. It's all so complicated by fascinating.
Homosexuality itself was brought into our world by Shinu No Hafuri and Ama No Hafuri, who were possible servants of Amaterasu. Shinu died and Ama was so overcome with grief, they killed themselves and were buried alongside Shinu. So basically it's like any other tragic love story that was a popular genre of the era. Amaterasu herself is depicted as bi/pansexual, and she's the central godfigure, so when the head honcho is queer, it's kind of hard to find religious fault for any hatred. If anyone tries to justify their phobias using Shinto, it'd be the most hilariously inept thing ever.
So there's no reason for me to loathe myself or try to justify my faith with my sexuality when there is no issue to begin with, nor is there need to create one. And even if there was issue with it, I see no reason for me not to start my own sect and interpret the teachings as I will and change behavior and views form within my own faith. Remember, Shinto encourages individual belief, so this wouldn't be too big of a problem. Queer Theology is also a viable educational path now, and wouldn't require much if at all for Shinto anyways, if I ever needed it.
What about other hot-button issues like abortion or medicine or science?
Abortion is accepted quite so and is secular in Japan. There is nothing in Shinto about it.
There is nothing against medicine/science/using nature to help. I am not holding any progress back. People like anti-vaccers and BEEP BOOP USE ONLY LOGIC are the worst.
And for the record, masturbation isn't a sin, either. Hell, some of the only major sins are incest and bestiality, and even then destroying crops is seen as a worse crime. Just wash yourself after you fap or sin, would you? Be sanitary with your sister-fucking, gosh.
So who do you choose to worship/venerate?
I have a few kami I'm particularly fond of.
Amaterasu-ōmikami - Hey this may be like one of the only names/words some of you will recognize. Amaterasu is the goddess of the sun and our universe and the central god figure of the faith. She was born of her father Izanagi-no-Mikoto's left eye after he stopped to bath the filth from Yomi (land of the dead) off of him as he tried to retrieve his wife Izanami-no-Mikoto from it. She's vain and a big foodie and somewhat of a perv, but she's still our mother figure and she who brings us warmth and light. She's the goddess from whom the royal family of Japan is descended from.
How big of a foodie is she? The main shrine that houses her, the Shrine at Ise, offers her a ton of food twice every day. Most festivals/matsuri include a lot of booze and food. She also vanquished her twin brother, the moon god Tsukuyomi, to forever only rule the night and be separate from her, calling him evil, for the mere act of killing the food goddess Uke Mochi. He was disgusted by how she served it (coughing up rice, spitting up fish, and crapping out game animals) and just up and killed her, her body becoming rice, millet, beans, and silkworms. Don't fuck with Amaterasu's food.
The vanity and her being a pervert come form the same tale. Amaterasu's other brother, the storm god Susano-o, and her got into a fight (some family) and she hid in a cave and the sun stopped rising. How did they lure her out? The goddess of mirth and dawn and revelry, Ame No Uzume, came out and did a dance exposing her vagina and breasts, offering Amaterasu to come look. She did. With gusto. While admiring herself in a mirror. While she was distracted by boobs, they sealed the cave off.
You all probably know her form the video game Okami where she was a wolf who peed on everything. The game itself isn't 100% accurate to Shinto but the core tenets and the personality of the kami are still spot on. You probably noticed how much she ate and how much she liked to stare at boobs, amongst other things.
She's a good woman and I'm glad to work under her. May her golden rays shine down on us, guide us, and warm us forevermore.
Hachiman - AKA Hachiman-jin and Yahata-no-kami. Kami of warriors and samurai. His symbol is the mitsudomoe, which is a pattern you've probably seen a lot. I want to get one tattooed on my right shoulder somewhere, someday. Kind of hard for me not to have a war or warrior god in my personal pantheon, what with my role in life being a protector and how much emphasis I place on my ability to be reliable and strong. Also a figure in Buddhism.
Benzaiten - AKA Ichikishima-hime-no-mikoto, Benten-dō, and Saraswati. Indian deity imported to Japan and added to Buddhist and Shinto worship. Goddess of things that flow, like water, words, knowledge, speech, music, and eloquence. Being a writer, I need to call upon that now and again.
I've called upon others before, but these are the central three, with Amaterasu being the most important to me.
Hey, you're largely nocturnal, why are you worshiping a sun goddess? How does that even work?
I can say as she rises and make sure she gets up safely before I go to sleep.
That and someone has to make sure Tsukuyomi isn't doing anything stupid like killing more food gods out of some insane need to sanitize everything with too much Lysol. I'm Amaterasu's night guard.
That and it's not like gods don't have call forwarding when it comes to prayer or anything. They're not that inept.
What else do you believe out of all this?
I'm quite heavily into respecting nature and the kami. This is where I am definitely more Koshinto in tradition. How individual/personal I am about faith in general and how I'd like to be a good female role model/influence/shaman also reflect my Koshinto nature. I'm naturally quite shamanistic and animistic and always have been, even before I adhered to any faith. I've also always been big on keeping Earth nice. I find as I get older, I become more and more Koshinto, though I think some more modern Shinto roots will always stick in me.
I'm not too big on the respecting family if only because my family has a lot of issues I deem them unworthy of such things like being praised in faith, but I will respect anyone worthy of it, ancestor or living or elder or younger, if I feel they should be. Also I have some stupid ancestors I rather feel the need to apologize for rather than venerate, like Sylvester Graham. I am so sorry, you guys.
I need to work harder on the staying physically clean, but I definitely got the booze and food part down.
I revere the kami well, and always keep Amaterasu in my thoughts. I believe everyone is her child, or at least somehow related (the kami and humans fucked a lot way back when, we're all bound to be related to some kami) and that since her golden rays touch and warm all and discriminate against none, neither shall I. Shinto is for everyone she can reach, and doesn't just belong to cranky old men in Japan.
I believe everyone has a right to believe in whatever belief or non-belief system they want. The second you try to convert or condemn is when you cross the line. I don't want to be converted nor can I be such, and I know not to do this to others. It's disgusting and cruel. Knock that shit off. Your rights end where mine begin, and vice-versa. Nobody is a coward or immature or stupid for believing any one way, unless they're being a jackhole about it.
I believe there exists a chance, should it ever become provable god(s) exist or not, that my way could be incorrect, and I will accept that. I believe there exists a chance I could be right. There exists a chance all of us could be right all at once and what the individual believes is what shapes creation and afterlife for them. There exists a chance we all could be wrong. There exists a chance that, should any of us figure this all out, the universe will change what the answer is just to fuck with us. There exists a chance that's already happened, possibly multiple times. So why fight over it? There are no absolutes beyond what you know for you.
I also believe in existentialism, bushido, and chivalry.
Hey, your girlfriend is atheist! You're ruining her with your stupid sky wizards! / She's ruining you with her cold science!
Not our fault we see science and religion as two sides of the same coin and not mortal enemies. I'm sorry you can't reconcile the fact two people of two different beliefs use it to compliment each other and give each other interesting points of view rather than use it as an excuse to kill each other. Theology and philosophy are sexy. Do you think if I fuck an atheist girl she explodes or something?
Also science =/= atheism you need to sit down.
How did you come to know about Shinto and convert?
There's actually no grand story here. We were studying world religions for history class in high school, I think 10th grade, and I got to Eastern faiths and found a book on Shinto. I realized that it was what I was already following based on my own morals my whole life; I wasn't raised to be any particular faith and had been rather agnostic until then. It was like finding out what I already was and that it had a name. It just made sense. So here we are.
I've since come to love it and its diverse mythos and way of life. it really is a great religion full of amazing little things.
What would you like to do with your faith?
I've been told I'd be good at writing theology papers/essays on the subject of Shinto/Koshinto and modern reflections of it and maybe rewriting/sorting out the myths.
I've also been told I could be a good theological mediator regarding belief and nonbelief in general and perhaps bridge some gaps of hatred and misunderstanding, lest we all tear each other apart. This can be achieved through open discussion and more papers/essays.
Someday, if I have the money, I'd like to build and open a shrine in the north Bay Area here in California where I live and offer it as sanctuary to everyone regardless of what they believe and have it be inclusive and a place people can go to study or debate. Attaching a brewery or small restaurant to it would be really cool, too, adding in my love of cooking.
Until then, all I can do is be like a wandering monk type, spreading good will and educating people where and when I can. The internet just makes this easier. Focusing on my martial arts and meditating helps and acts as a subset of my faith almost and makes me feel closer to them; a lot of the philosophy of things like Bushido is heavily Shinto based, after all. I can act as sanctuary and confidant all on my own for now.
If you weren't Shinto, what would you be?
Definitely something polytheistic. Maybe revive some Greek or Norse ways. Anything with a shamanism influence. Perhaps Hindu. The only Abrahamic path I could see myself following is Gnosticism.
I don't think I could envision myself without religion, no matter how many struggles I've had with it in life. Why? I don't know. It just is. It's a part of me, and I've come to accept it and embrace it.
Can I ever come to you about crisis of faith or just to talk religion or debate? / Can I ask you more about Shinto?
Always. Just remember respect is key.
Any sites you can recommend for Shinto?
Besides Wikipedia, I find this encyclopedia to be of immense use.
I also like the Shrine of Ise site, if only so I can keep track of any festivals I should pay attention to.
Also, for fun, look up Hounen Matsuri.
Now if you'll excuse me, I'm going to go contemplate rocks while drinking.
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Date: 2012-02-29 11:09 am (UTC)From:THIS. This is very much how I feel and I've yet to see another person express it so succinctly. Also, this entire entry is awesome and you should feel awesome.