Since this thread has been revived, I will tell you another definition of a temple that has always struck me as very sensible.

In a novel by the Dane Kelvin Lindemann ("Huset med det grønne Træ" = "The House with the Green Tree") from the 1940s we follow a young couple in the latter half of the 1700s that have just been married. Being both completely unexperienced, there is some embarrassment when they undress before going to bed. The young husband wants to blow out the candles, but the wife (a strong-willed and very intelligent woman) snatches the candelabrum out of of his hands, puts it on a bedside table, and dropping her last piece of dress says, "Look at my body, Faith, it is the temple of God!"

dskoon wrote:What about the temple of the mountains, and of the sea?

Polytheism (whose adherents used to be called Pagans) seems to fit best with devotion to the outdoors. Big gods and little gods and those in between. The god of Everest and the god of Mt. Baldy. And no one condemns you if you worship one but not another.

But try to get a religious tax exemption for a pagan-based organization.

Mountain Impulse wrote:But try to get a religious tax exemption for a pagan-based organization.

The Native American Church is tax-exempt and basically pagan.

US military cemeteries now allow Wiccan headstones along with Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim and others.

Arthur Digbee wrote:

Mountain Impulse wrote:But try to get a religious tax exemption for a pagan-based organization.

The Native American Church is tax-exempt and basically pagan.

US military cemeteries now allow Wiccan headstones along with Christian, Jewish, Hindu, Muslim and others.

The ancient Nordic gods (Odin, Thor, Freya and the lot) are again an officially recognized religion in Denmark, so if someone believing in them were to immigrate into the U.S. become a citizen and serve in the army I think you would have to recognize that too, or face charges of religious discrimination!

After 9/11 a female believer in this religion on the internet in a formal curse (a so-called 'nidstang') called upon Odin, Thor and Tyr (the god of war) to avenge this foul deed!

Ejnar Fjerdingstad wrote:The ancient Nordic gods (Odin, Thor, Freya and the lot) are again an officially recognized religion in Denmark, so if someone believing in them were to immigrate into the U.S. become a citizen and serve in the army I think you would have to recognize that too, or face charges of religious discrimination!

After 9/11 a female believer in this religion on the internet in a formal curse (a so-called 'nidstang') called upon Odin, Thor and Tyr (the god of war) to avenge this foul deed!

I would say that the curse worked.

Arthur Digbee wrote:

Mountain Impulse wrote:But try to get a religious tax exemption for a pagan-based organization.

The Native American Church is tax-exempt and basically pagan.

Interesting. I would never have imagined that there could be such a thing as "The Native American Church" anymore than I could imagine "The Christian Church."