The assignment is to take a particular religious tradition and describe the relationship within it between the official and popular faith. Basically to compare the old-fashioned, formal method of a tradition to the more common, everyday method. Any ideas on what tradition? It can be any faith. Thank you!
2007-06-17 10:49:19 · 10 answers · asked by Anonymous in Society & Culture ➔ Religion & Spirituality
Hi - thanks for the responses so far but I'm really looking for specific religious TRADITIONS on the small and large scale. Thanks!
2007-06-17 10:54:36 · update #1
Christianity is the most widely written on, and would be the easiest to research.
2007-06-17 10:52:41 · answer #1 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
You really need to choose a religion which interests you. There is disparity between "official" and "popular" religious practices in many religions, so I think you have a lot of options.
Islam comes to mind for me as one that might be interesting. There is an interest among some Muslims in relics, but this seems to be quite possibly at odds with the strict teachings against idolatry in Islam. Also, there is a practice of celebrating Muhammad's birthday, called Mawlid al-nabi I think, which is frowned upon by more strict Muslims who do not think that any human should be celebrated to that degree. But the birthday is celebrated in popular Islam. So that could be interesting.
Buddhism is another good choice. In official Buddhism, you do not take refuge in deities, and yet in popular Buddhism, many people do pujas (worship ceremonies) for various deities.
The important thing is to pick something you really would enjoy learning about! Have fun!
2007-06-17 18:18:55 · answer #2 · answered by Heron By The Sea 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
You can pick up the traditional practice of the celebration of Eid in Islam. A good option is Eid-ul-Fitr, which happens after Ramadan. If you do not want a Muslim tradition, a Hindu tradition may be likable. You may look into their earlier practices of suttee and life bondage to the male partner in comparison to the more modern methodologies today. If not, then please take someone else's advice.
2007-06-17 17:58:56 · answer #3 · answered by hidden_soul_11 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋
Um, you'll probably not agree with this, but you can do official Buddhism with popular Buddhism. www.attan.com has pretty much everything you need. But I'll give you a little disclaimer, if you are a practicing Buddhist you probably don't want to venture in there unless you have a lot of patience and a really open mind regarding someone's absolute and rigid beliefs.
2007-06-17 17:54:10 · answer #4 · answered by Julian 6 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I think you could write an interesting & compelling paper about the practice of female genital mutilation, originally coming from the naturalist religions of African peoples & being adapted by many Islamic followers.... which is still taking place to this day.
I dont know a lot about the history & progression of this practice from old to modern times, but I know it's still happening & should be spoken of, and fought to abolish. Educating yourself & others about this issue is a pretty good reason to write a paper about it.
2007-06-17 18:00:24 · answer #5 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
I recently did research on the Ancient Jewish Wedding. It was very easy to find information and the ancient traditions certainly differ from today's weddings....especially in Western society.
2007-06-17 17:56:52 · answer #6 · answered by moviesmiss1 3 · 0⤊ 0⤋
For instance Methodist and Baptist use to have 2 services on Sunday, i.e. one in the a.m. and one in the p.m.
Today they have 2 services on Sunday and both are in the a.m. and at different times. 9:00 a.m. and 11:00 a.m.
Most Protestant churches had preachers who preached against sinning. Seldom today do you hear any church preach against sinning. They preach on one or two verses from the Bible and many different stories are told.
I can remember when women would never have thought about wearing pants to church.
2007-06-17 18:02:20 · answer #7 · answered by Jeancommunicates 7 · 0⤊ 0⤋
I would do it on marriage, you could write about that for any faith. Maybe it would be interesting to write about marriage in the mormon faith, you could write about the tradition of temple marriage that they practice today compared to the polygamous marriage they practiced in the 1800's.
2007-06-17 17:59:33 · answer #8 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
The first one that comes to my mind is the Catholic Mass which was spoken in Latin everywhere between the 3rd or 4th Century and the middle of the 20th Century.
Then they allowed it to be in the local language.
2007-06-17 17:55:42 · answer #9 · answered by Anonymous · 0⤊ 0⤋
Check out paganism as it is the practice of witchcraft but also the basis of Christianity.
www.wikipedia.org
2007-06-17 17:52:54 · answer #10 · answered by susan s 2 · 0⤊ 0⤋