Are there serious practitioners of ancient religions left in today's developed countries?
478750
Yes actually, in this very country. There are very few instances of it, but the fed. government has set up reservation-like areas for Practioners Of Old Principles And Religions, or P.O.O.P.A.R. You typically find these areas in sparsely habited or states that nobody wants to be in, such as Kansas, Nebraska and northern Nevada.
1084553
I think religion today  is a matter of comfort. Being seen, being in a community, comfort for the after-life.\n\nReligion was very useful 1000 years ago to keep people down, to control and earn power.\n\nThis was very brief tho.
611338
I'm Wiccan, Celtic Generational Tradition.  My family, on my mothers side, have practiced Wicca for hundreds of years with PROOF to back that up!  While most now days are Gardierian there are traditions that date back before that, in some cases hundreds of years.  To make a blanket statement that we can't is a fabrication. Most of those in a generational tradition do not advertise or promote or even, in some cases, come out and say they are Wiccan because of harassment and persecution.  Those things still go on today because of the small mindedness of religions and what some of them teach.  There are traditions in Europe who can prove they go further back than some religions.  While, no days, there are many posers or people who claim to be Wiccan to be 'different' a large chunk of us out there are neither.  We take our religion just as serious as those of other religions do.  It is a part of who we are not just something we do.
852089
Not that I am aware of.  In fact, some branches of some religions don't even believe in using symbols at all.
785942
There is no comparison between the two areas, since their philosophy is different! The Asians are polytheistic while the USA are mainly Monotheistic (the god of Abraham is only accepted)!\nAlso, democracy, a creation of the classical Greeks was spread in the west but not in the East!
558555
Yes, it is the oldest continuing religion on Earth. The Rig Veda is the oldest sacred text in the world (first written down in about 5000BCE, but before this time it was merely memorized and chanted). \n\nThe most liberal? Perhaps it should be said that it is the most tolerant. Some denominations and sects and subsects of Hinduism could definately be defined as liberal, but some denominations, sects, and subsects can be very conservative, or orthodox, or traditional. So it varies...but they are all very tolerant. In fact, tolerance and respect are the rule rather than the exception. It is rare that Hindu sects, denominations, and subsects are intolerant or disrespectful. In the past Hinduism was extremely liberal compared to many religions during its time, but with the invasions of other religions and cultures into India, and the eventual colonization of India by the British...the influence and sometimes forced acceptance of those cultures, laws, and norms did have some effects on Hinduism. Many of the sages who is said to have written the Rig Veda were women, as well as men. \n\nAgain, though, "liberal" depends greatly on the individual denominations, sects, and subsects...the individual gurus, the individual temples and priests. It varies as to just how liberal they are. Many in India are trying to preserve the traditions while at the same time feeling the forces of western materialism taking its effects. This has caused there to be "fundamentalist" Hindus there. Hindus in the west (both of Indian origin and those who adopt Hinduism but aren't from India) often are much more liberal than even the "liberal" Hindus in India (although there are exceptions to some groups here in the west and even to those in India where there are groups there that are sometimes even more liberal than those in the west..so there are exceptions). \n\nSome great resources on Hinduism:\n\nhttp://www.bbc.co.uk/religion\nhttp://www.religioustolerance.org\nhttp://www.galva108.org\nhttp://www.westernhindu.com\nhttp://www.beliefnet.com\nhttp://www.sacred-texts.com
1095576
Actually there are Greeks that still worship the Gods of the old religion( including Poseidon!)! Check the following sites!
897047
Possibly but mostly by people of other religions.
1155311
No, because if you study the history of theology many religions existed before the Bible was written.
657468
They were once predominately Buddhist, but due to authoritarian rule, they have become predominately atheistic. This is not to say there are no other religions there for there are. But most are practiced in secret. Christians are martyred there almost daily by the government of China.
812247
Yes there are.  Look around any of the better universities and you'll find many students from India in graduate school, many are Hindu, not all.  In my student days I knew a number of devout Hindus in the upper Midwest and some gathered together for social and/or religious celebrations frequently.
345244
Islam is a a leftover remnant of the Middle Ages. Just as it would be a bad idea to listen to a doctor who practiced Middle Ages medicine (e.g. bleeding people?) and to listen to politicians from the Middle Ages (e.g. Machiavelli's Prince), it is a bad idea to blindly practice religions from the Dark Ages.\n\nChristians will tell you that Christianity is old like that, but if you look at the modern churches, they are very different and have changed, modernized. The ones that haven't modernized (polygamist Mormons, for instance) are negative influences on peoples lives. And yes, the same goes for Shinto and Hindu, look at the way that Shinto was used to justify WWII in Japan, and how some Hindus today are going on racist murderous rampages.
323692
Many religions...like Hinduism and Buddhism have embraced science, but also maintain certain traditions (like religious rituals, etc). And there are some western religions that do the same...well denominations or sects of western religions would be a better way of saying it. Some have evolved up to a certain point, and some are retrograding back to earlier times because they believe those times were more 'holy'.\n\nAnd the Baha'i religion (one of the youngest) not only teaches that religions evolve over time (which if you go back and study the histories of religion and what they believed at different time periods you'd see they are evolving...well some of them) and the Baha'i religion even teaches that new religions emerge to meet the demand of religion when other religions are failing to evolve.\n\nI'm a Hindu, though. That is why I know they embrace science so much and yet also keep to certain traditions (some traditions are just cultural and have nothing to do with the religion at all so as a westerner I don't observe them).
264906
Yeah, I do, mostly Mesoamerican religion. I specifically practice the Nahua (Aztec) religion previous to Christian contact (*ahem* subjugation), though I have also studied the beliefs of the Maya and know a few things about the neighboring cultures as well. I know a handful of other people who are trying to reclaim the native Mesoaemerican religions for the modern day, without Christian influence. There are other groups, more widespread, that still practice aspects of the native religion but with heavy Christian influence (i.e. monotheistic, using saints, moving native festivals to Christian dates, etc).\n\nThe major features shared by most traditional native religions of Mesoamerica are extensive pantheons of deities (often representing natural phenomenon such as rain and celestial bodies), belief in giving back to the gods in order to honor them (sacrifice, though it was viewed much differently than the stereotypical western conception of what sacrifice was about), the belief in cyclical divinitory calendar systems as well as calendars of religious festivals, and belief in multiple levels of reality (the spirit world being entirely real).\n\nIf you want to know more, I'll list my website and a couple others in the sources if you want to check them out.
937621
Not really.\n\nMost religions use an external belief in a 'God' or 'Jesus' to develop love and morality in their minds.\n\nBuddhists believe it is up to the individual to develop these traits. That's why Buddhism is sometimes called 'mind training' or a philosophy and not a religion.
915612
As long as there are indigenous peoples then there will be some form of their original religion practiced.  I know that it has been discouraged over the years but there are some going back to their origins and bringing back the old customs and beliefs such as with many American Indian tribes.  I have gleaned this through my studies in Anthropology (that was my major in college) and from my interest in American Indian cultures.
358377
All the religions are relics from Bronze Age. They have Bronze Age mentality, morality, and laws. They are out of sink with time. They should be retired into some museum together with the people who wish to believe in such fairytales.\n\nIn the Bronze Age, our knowledge of the objective world was also based on beliefs and myths. But already 2500 years ago Greeks learned to distinguish between beliefs and facts in the fields of logic, mathematics, physics, biology, and to some degree history. This was the beginning of true science. Science is the true religion of the modern people. Science has every capacity to explore the spiritual realm. Of course it would be a very different science, the science of the inner world, but still, it is a science, not mythology. Scientific inquiry, rather than religion can discover the necessary conditions for people to live in peace with each others.