I spent some time noodling with Buddhism. One of the interesting things there is that outside of certain places in Southeast Asia that means you are an atheist.
This gets interesting when talking to theists because, if you don’t point it out, many people will hear “he has a religion, he’s one of us”. Many assume Buddha is a deity.
If you do push the point, you learn that some people’s brains short out when you tell them there is a religion with hundreds of millions of followers that doesn’t have a God. The Venn diagram in their brain of Us and Them can’t process this fact.
This gets interesting when talking to theists because, if you don’t point it out, many people will hear “he has a religion, he’s one of us”. Many assume Buddha is a deity.
If you do push the point, you learn that some people’s brains short out when you tell them there is a religion with hundreds of millions of followers that doesn’t have a God. The Venn diagram in their brain of Us and Them can’t process this fact.