What's your opinion on Liberal Religion?

[Belacqua]

Reasons for belief?  I guess, if you're a convert.

I get what you're saying here. Most people are born into a religion and then may or may not come to question it later. Certainly a lot don't. 

I think that emjay and I were talking about the reasons that one might choose a religion, and this would include both choosing to join or choosing to stay, after you had grown up enough to interrogate why you're in the religion in the first place. 

Emjay found the more intellectual, metaphysical reasons to be a challenge to his faith. If certain tenets of the religion appear incompatible with modern science, that's a good reason to question. 

My take was that not so many people are as thoughtful as he is concerning the intellectual side. I suspect that people join or stay for reasons having more to do with lifestyle -- camaraderie, support, ethical encouragement, etc. And I think these are perfectly good reasons to be in a religion and, traditionally, probably more important than the theology. 

Here's my experience with the issue:

Many years ago I was spending time at a Zen Buddhist temple in the mountains outside Fukuyama. It was a pretty serious place; about half the people there ended up shaving their heads and becoming full-fledged monks. In terms of the lifestyle, it was idyllic. Beautiful place, like-minded people, all very calming. We worked outside, so we all got thin and tan and healthy, eating delicious organic meals we grew ourselves. The meditation was about four hours a day, and very settling to a confused mind. 

Nobody at the temple talked about Buddhist theology, because that isn't how Zen people do it. Nonetheless, Zen, like every other branch of Buddhism, is based on tenets about metaphysics. 

I realized that I could do it two ways: if I continued to spend time at the temple without thinking about the philosophy behind it, it was healthy and therapeutic but not really Buddhism. If I wanted to do it sincerely, I had to accept the philosophy. And I couldn't agree with the metaphysics, so I stopped. If I had continued to meditate for therapeutic reasons I'd probably be a healthier person today, but I stopped. 

So my position then was more like emjay's today. It was the intellectual part that became a deal-breaker. I could have stayed in just for the lifestyle, and the camaraderie, and the good food. A lot of people do, and I don't look down on that choice.