Space travel might get you around the solar system, but these are some of your guides to travel to entirely new worlds.

I came to Christianity from a background of Buddhism, just a few thoughts:

Common misunderstanding I frequently point out: Buddhism is not about living in the present. “A morning without a meditation on death is a morning wasted (and afternoon, evening)” Living in the moment brings attachments which lead to desires and suffering.

This is a great summary IMO from r/Buddhism/168tbg – “To be completely blunt, I think the dominant ideology of /r/Buddhism, which can be put into a simple New Age mottoo: “Just. Be. Here. Now.” has not much to do with real Buddhism, at all. I think it’s in fact the exact opposite of what the Buddha taught. We purposelessly wander in samsara in birth-and-death precisely because we are always “in the present moment”, attached to whatever the present experience seems to show, and fail to see the big picture. But the big picture that the Buddha wants us to see is exactly what the New Age ideology demands us to ditch (thinking about the big picture / future rebirth(s) / Nirvana is shunned as “not being in the present moment” or “desiring enlightenment” – as if it was bad! As if the Buddha didn’t have a super-strong, stubborn desire for enlightenment that made him abandon the “present moment” of “enjoying” his time with his wife – most future/goal-oriented guy ever, far from the Big Lebowski, the Buddha was certainly not a “chill dude”: look what he sacrificed! look how hard he practised! the discipline, the determination! “I spit on my life – death would be better for me than not reaching my goal, victory over life and death”! – I paraphrase. Let’s not fool ourselves here about who He was.)

The real quote says exactly the opposite: let go of the past, future and present, and cross over to the farthest shore of existence. Now that’s a completely different story, at least to me.”

Humanism, hedonism, etc. encourage indulging in the present moment. Taken to the extreme look at Diogenes of Sinope. When asked how to avoid the temptations of lust, Diogenes simply began publicly masturbating: “If only I could sooth my belly by rubbing it.”

That sounds funny, and even begs the question, why are incessant drunkenness and having mass orgies out of style? Problem is, these indulgent actions deny that there is deeper meaning, or a higher happiness, that can be achieved. They also deny that there are undesirable future repercussions to these actions.

Buddha taught detachment from desires, that these bring suffering, and at the least distraction. If someone is going along with their fleeting whims, they are not going to find enlightenment or nirvana. Letting go of attachments frees the soul to experience bliss without being pulled back down to more primal desires.

Think about giving your favorite novel to a barn animal. The animal is driven by its physical sensations, and it will not be amused by the book because it’s not good for eating. But you understand there is a higher reward from that book than the senses provide, and perhaps even feel bad the animal cannot comprehend it.

Buddha said forget sensations, let go of the plot of that book, even lose the desire to live in a body, and just be; bask in the blissful state (I believe he was describing a state of unbridled or unconditional love) that one can find in a limited form in this life. Buddha said enlightenment can be experienced in extremely fleeting moments in this life, but one can attempt to achieve in their next rebirth. Walk in the “middle path” in the mean time to responsibly take care of life’s needs.

I now believe in Christianity, but believed in Buddhism for about eight years, and still study it to reconcile my past beliefs with my new, and in no way do I dismiss the wisdom Buddha had. IMHO, the Dalai Lama doesn’t represent Buddha’s ideals as well as he could, and I think that has some to do with Buddhism being seen as a New Age (which frequently dismisses the severity of bad actions) or hippie-ish belief set. Buddha was an intense teacher!

Hopefully that makes some sense

Do you mind telling me why you are now Christian?

Testimonial evidence is what convinced me. There are lots of stories like this that and are too complex to be imaginations, too emotional to be dreams, and too consistent to be hallucinations. When I hear so many people share stories like this with consistent patterns and without financial or other possibly motivating incentives, I’d be in denial to dismiss them.

I’ve heard the argument that experiences like these are biologically hard-coded, but that’s not possible because DNA only codes for physical protein structures, which are limited to hard-coding little more than instincts. Also, there is likely no evolutionary incentive for these experiences to exist after reproduction has occurred (rather than possibly calmness in elders which could served by simple calming sensations, but these experiences are frequently very frightening) and especially not in the very last momets of life. Conscious experiences are not based on genetics, but on the mind (or soul). I’m now convinced the world has a Creator, which I used to think was an outlandish idea, and knowledge is kept semi-hidden mostly as a moral test we’re not fully aware of.

I am not nearly as familiar with Hindu concepts as I would like to be, so most of those topics are outside of my realm of knowledge.

My view on the Bible now is that the original Hebrew and Greek is based on the verse “All Scripture is inspired by God and profitable for teaching, for reproof, for correction” (2 Tim 3:16). Of course, that sounds like circular logic – the Bible is right because it says it’s right, so I had to personally come to the conclusion first that the Creator’s words are written down in it.

My best presumption is before Biblical revelations, the laws of our next life were based closely on Buddhist understandings (maybe Hindu also), but then the mass revelation at Mt. Sinai to the Jews began the Torah, which put them under a new convenant that the rest of the world wouldn’t hear until later. Then prophets finishing off the rest of the Old Testament, and Jesus fulfilling the blood sacrifice law to mass witnesses, again creating a newer covenant. So those who believe Jesus was the Messiah will be judged per Christian law, those who accept Torah, but deny Jesus will be judged per Torah law, and those outside of those covenants will be judged less harshly (there is a verse about being better off not hearing/believing? the Gospels than rejecting them), but still harshly under karmic law. Buddha definitely believed in hellish rebirths (Naraka).

If you have the time, I recommend reading all of this: Buddhist cosmology (wikipedia)

I just paid attention to the lyrics of John Lennon’s Imagine for the first time and was blown away by how Satanic they are. I went ahead and translated them after getting the melody stuck in my head in case they weren’t clear enough. The message of the song is overtly about living for the moment and suggests a (false) peace if life was stripped of the depths of its meaning. It has well over 30 million views on the most popular upload with 98% ‘Liking’ it. Such a “cheery” Anti-Christ song from a man who was actually known to be quite abusive despite his public image.

Imagine there’s no Heaven
Let’s take away that hope
No Hell to worry us
No fear of consequence
Imagine all the people
Living for themselves…

Imagine there’s no countries,
but one-world government
No one to live or die for
And no religion too
Imagine all the people
Reduced to animals…

You may say I’m a dreamer
We should only live for fun
I hope someday you’ll join us
And the world will be depraved

Imagine no possessions
Where we can’t help ourselves
No food to eat or nice things
Trusting authority
Imagine all the mayhem
But I just want more drugs…

You may say I’m retarded
But my soul has been exchanged
I hope in Hell you’ll join us
Satan wrote this song for me.

Time could be short.