Explain what religion is, and give your opinion as to whether religion is different from spirituality.

Explain what religion is, and give your opinion as to whether religion is different from spirituality.

Identify three surprising concepts that you learned about religion in this course, and explain why they surprised you.

Religion is a form of a practice that is adopted by the human race throughout the history to find a meaning to life and develop a connection with a higher power who might help the human race understand the wonders of the universe. In my opinion religion and spirituality are two different things. We might think of religion as a way to attain spirituality but spirituality itself is not dependent on religion. I mean there is a possibility that people who do not believe in any religion are very spiritual or have means of getting spiritual satisfaction.

If I had to identify three surprising concepts of religion I would say they are the need to have a higher power or God, life after death and Buddhism teachings.

Humans are helpless in many things, especially understanding the meaning of life. They therefore, need to connect themselves to God to try and understand the wonders of the universe.

Life after death is also sort of necessary to keep a balance between good and evil in the worldly life in an expectation of a better after life.

I have always thought of Buddhism as a traditional religion. But now I understand it to be something on the borderline of being a religion and a non-religion. Buddha did not give an clear instructions about practicing any form of worshiping a higher power.