Why I am anti-Christian

 I just learned about this yesterday: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Buddhist_crisis I'd known that famous monk who set himself on fire was a follower of the same branch of Buddhism I do, Pure Land, but I didn't know all the details because things like this are never-ever taught or even whispered about here in the Empire. 

And here I thought the Catholics were a bit less crazy than followers of other branches of that death-cult... 

It's also why I side with Israel come hell or high water. As an Abrahamic religion, Judaism is still insultingly stupid, but at least it's not evangelical. The other two branches, Christianity and Islam, have at their core the belief that it's convert-or-die, and that it's better to burn someone at the stake or torture them to death than that they not convert. Because they're going to Hell anyway yadda yadda. 

At least with Jews it's live-and-let-live. Jews also get points for actually having encoded in their religion and general beliefs the kind of long-term thinking that you find in Asian cultures, and the idea that family means something. In Judaism, you need a minyan, which is 10 people, together at least, to do proper prayers and it's even a thing in Jewish neighborhoods to, if you're Jewish, to have a fellow Jew come up to you and say you're needed to complete a minyan for prayers. 

In Buddhism we have the Three Jewels, being Buddha, Dharma, and Sangha. Dharma is how you live your life, and Sangha is your community. Supposedly the Buddha was asked which is more important of the latter two and he said Sangha because you might fall away from the Dharma on your own but your Sangha would get you back on track. 

And so it's come to pass that Jews are not badly thought of in Asia, as they think long-term, actually have a meaningful family structure and the idea of mutual aid, and they don't push their beliefs on anyone. It was hilarious when one of the "China YouTubers" who'd been in China long enough to marry a Chinese gal, found that her parents were disappointed that he was not a Jew. 

Yesterday and last night, having mailed off that big load of packages and done all that stuff, I came home and cooked up some dinner and by that time was getting tired enough that it was all I could do to stay awake to nearly midnight. If I'm used to being up until midnight, my schedule is still compatible with Ken's as he doesn't stay here much past midnight, and I'm still awake at 8 or 9 to have the day to do things.