How to have a conversation about RELIGION in English

You are healed. You are...

Hi, James from engVid.

When I'm not actually teaching English, sometimes

I do religious services. I'm joking, but this is a serious matter.

By the end of this video,

I would like to make sure that when you speak to people of different religious faiths or backgrounds,

you will be able to, when you will remember that...

Well, how to talk about religion, or faith, or belief. Okay? Sometimes we talk about religion, and sometimes we can

say "faith" or "belief" and it means to believe in a higher power; it could be God, it could

be a Spirit, whatever moves you.

I think it's kind of a serious lesson, because religion is a very powerful force in our lives,

and we should be respectful of one another or to each other when we discuss it. You can't

have an open dialogue if you have a closed mind. "Dialogue" means to talk, okay? So,

this lesson is to help you be able to speak to someone else who doesn't believe the same

way you do, so at least you understand each other. Listen to me carefully: You don't have

to always agree or like, but you can respect and understand, and that's today's lesson.

So, ready to get serious? Let's go to the board, shall we? Okay.

So, you'll notice I have different symbols up here. I am a terrible drawer. I can't do

anything. The worm is as good... Sorry, E. Mr. E is as good as I get, so this is as good

as you're going to get. So if you go: "My faith is not there. I'm Bahai." I'm like:

"You're behind me, because I don't know how to draw it. Sorry." So, here are some of the

world's major religions that have billions of people that follow, or hundreds of millions.

So I tried my best. Forgiveness if I didn't get it quite right. Okay? Nobody get upset.

I did a bad drawing for all of you.

Let's go to the board. One of the most common questions people say when they talk about

religion, they meet you and go:

"Hi. My name is James. I'm from Canada. I teach English. Do you believe in God?"

And that's the problem right there. "Do you believe in God?"

You're going: "What's the problem? It's a question." Yeah, but it's a yes/no question. Please check

out the other videos I have on making interesting conversation, because especially in this one,

when you say yes or no, you really limit the person, or we say put them in a corner. You

put me in a place where I'm with you or against you. Already we have division or friction.

So why don't we ask a question that lets them speak to us, and explain to them where we're

coming from so that we can get a mutual understanding? Now we understand together.

And I think I've got two questions that can help you make friends from different faiths,

so you understand each other and start that dialogue. Remember? Talking. If you say:

"Are you a person of faith?" you're not... They can say yes or no, but you're actually not

saying "God". Remember I said "faith" or "belief"? "Belief" means to think something is real.

"Faith" means to believe something... Believe in something. And when you're thinking of

that, I don't necessarily have to think of God. I could think of a force that makes the

world go around. Gaia. Some people believe in Gaia. Life... The Earth is alive and we're

part of the Earth. That's a belief, it's a faith. Some people believe... Have... Well,

you don't have a belief in science. You could say it's a belief, but they believe in science.

Right? And that has nothing to do with God. So when people say: "Do you believe in God?"

They're really saying: "There are those who believe in God, and the blasphemers and the heathens",

and it doesn't have to be like that. Some people don't believe in the book,

but they actually believe in the same God you do. So, give them a break. Okay? And ask:

"Hey, are you a person of faith?" And they might say:

"Yes, I do believe in a higher power." Okay?

Another question you can have that's like a "do" question, is:

"Do you have a faith that you follow?" And that means: Do you have ideas that you believe in,

that you think are true, and you actually work with them or work to improve yourself based on these

ideas? That's what the Bible, and the Torah, and the Talmud, and the Quran are about. Right?

Those are some basic books. Or the Tao Te Ching; self-improvement by following certain

principles. So, if I follow a faith, I follow these rules and live my life by them. Okay?

Now, once you ask a person: "Are you a person of faith?" or "Do you follow a faith?" you

might get the following response: "Yes, I'm very religious. Hmmm." Or:

"I'm spiritual, man. Can you see the vibes? Can you see the colours? It's all around you, you know?"

They might go: "I'm agnostic, yes. I'm educated. I am eating away from agnostic, away from

knowledge, I'm away from the knowledge of a possible god, so I don't know; therefore,

I will not speak about it." See, "agnostic" doesn't mean I don't believe in God, it means

I have no knowledge about it, therefore I cannot talk about it. It's not the same as

"atheist". Okay? "Gnosis" means knowledge, and "a" means away from knowledge.

"Atheist" is different. "Atheist" means: "I don't believe. I don't believe in no God or

no Jesus, or nothing like that up there." Okay? So, if someone tells you they're agnostic,

don't treat them the same as atheist. Now, I might have been a little quick on something,

so I have to make sure you understand agnostic and atheist.

Let's go to "religious" and "spiritual". Remember? When we talk about being religious... "Religion"

means there is a book, and that book has rules or suggestions that you should follow, and

a belief system, or someone that's the head. So, I'll give an example in the Christian

religion, somebody believes there's a God, a being called God, there are some rules that

they have to follow in order to be Christian. And in this case, Jesus Christ wrote the rules

that you follow, and that's why it's a religion, a way of living and life.

"Spiritual" is more a belief that there is something more than what you see.

We call this the material world. "We live in a material..." No, not the Madonna song.

Get it out of your head, clear it.

When you live in the material world, it's what you can see. If I cannot

smell it, hear it, touch it, or taste it - it doesn't exist. The world of science, the material

world. In the spiritual world, they believe I see what's here, but I believe there's something

else out there. What it is, I don't know. It could be a god, it could be a spirit. In

Japan, they believe there are spirits in the water and in the mountains, but they don't

actually believe in a god, one big god. In the... In America and in England, they believe

in a God. Some people believe in Allah in... In the Arabic or the Islamic faith, they believe

in Allah. Okay? That would be more religious. Spiritual, there's just something. Okay?

So, we've gone through "religious", "spiritual", "agnostic", and "atheist". This is how you

would define yourself. If someone said: "Are you a person of faith?" you could say:

"I have no faith. I'm an atheist." Agnostic, "gnosis" being knowledge, and away from; I

have no knowledge of God or other, so I don't know, and that's what they're saying. Agnostics

are saying: "I don't know", so leave them alone. They're not trying to get on one team

or the other. Okay?

Now, we talked about where are you. If you are one of these things, and probably this

one, religious, you're going to go, where? To these places. "Synagogue". A "synagogue"

is for Jewish people. Okay? They're one of the oldest books of religion, and they believe

there was a God that created our world, and they go to a synagogue to worship their God.

"Worship" means to pay respect to-right?-and get in contact with. So, if you worship your

God, you want to give respect to the God for creating the world for you, and contact; have

that God communicate with you in some way so you know what to do with your life.

Now, if you're a Muslim or you study Islam, you go to a "mosque", also known as a "masjid".

Masjid, masjid. Don't kill me, I'm trying, okay? I said three different ways. Okay? So

you go to a mosque or a masjid.

"Churches" are used for Christian faith or Christ. You can remember that with the "Ch",

think: "Christian", "Christ", "Church". Okay?

"Shrines", Hindus have shrines. Okay? You can also have a shrine in your house. So,

this isn't just for a religious thing; you can have a shrine in your house. For some

losers in North America, specifically Toronto, they have a shrine to Maple Leafs. Yeah, I

said it. They suck, stop collecting their cards and stuff. But a shrine is a place where

you go to, and you may pray at it, and try and communicate with your God. It can be in

your house, or can be a bigger place where people gather and go together. Okay? You can't

have a church in your house, but you can have a shrine. Shrine. Shrine up here.

"Temple". Now, some people who are Jewish call the synagogue the temple. Not everyone.

It's called the synagogue. But a temple is a place of worship outside around the world.

I don't know all the places. I'm not going to lie and make it up for you, but it's another

place of worship that people go to if they're going to the temple.

If you've ever seen Indiana Jones-please watch it; great movie

-he goes to the Temple of Doom. Seriously, it's a temple

of doom, really. Anyway, but you can go see that, and you'll see it was a place of worship

from a long time ago. Okay? Yeah, his heart gets ripped out, and he runs from a great

big rock. Yeah? Serious business was with the temple. Don't mess with them. All right?

And a general, general term is "a place of worship". So you can just say:

"Hey, where's your place of worship?" and then they can tell you: "Synagogue", "mosque", "church",

"shrine", or "temple", and then you'll have an idea of which faith they follow.

Now, each particular group has a leader that's usually in one of these places, and the leaders

have different names. In Islam, it's an "imam". Imam? Imam. Imam. Imam. I'm home. Okay, so

the imam is the leader of the mosque. In the Judaic faith or Judaism, it's a "rabbi". Okay?

Christians, we're kind of special folk, we're special. You know why? Because we got three

names. Depends where you are, you can have a "pastor", a "reverend", or a "preacher",

also "priest", but I want to come back to "priest" after. You usually hear about a preacher

in the southern states of the United States of America. In Canada, people don't generally

talk about preachers. They'll talk about their pastor or their reverend. In most other places,

like Great Britain, they'll talk about the pastor; not the preacher. But American and

southern baptism, they'll talk about the preacher man. The preacher man don told us. [Laughs]

Okay? But we also have "priests" if you're a Catholic. Right? Catholic, you have priests,

and they are similar to these other ones.

I've put a star beside the "priest" or the "priestess" because outside, if you don't

know about someone's religion or you're travelling to a foreign country, and these terms don't

apply because they're for specific religions, you can say: "Is that the priest or the priestess?"

because it would be the holy person. I guess that's another one you can say: "the holy person".

But when we hear "priest" or "priestess" we know it's the leader of that particular

group. Okay? And they're holy people. They have a...

Maybe spiritual or maybe they're religious. Okay? Cool.

Now, I want to end this lesson on something very quickly, because this can make a huge

or a very big difference in what we talk and how we talk to each other, and you need to

pay attention to respect them. "Non-practicing". Many people are religious. They'll say: "I'm Christian",

or "I'm Jewish", or "I'm... I'm Muslim", or what have you, or a Hindu. And...

But what they say is... What they say is... Oh, sorry. I don't want to forget the "How"

before I get off. But what they say when they talk about this is they're "non-practicing",

they mean they believe in a religion, but they are not in church or observing the rules.

So, if you're Jewish, for instance, and you don't go to the synagogue and you eat bacon,

you're a non-practicing Jew if you say:

"Hey, I still believe in Judaism. I just like a bacon sandwich, and I'm not going to the synagogue today. Got it?"

But you can still be Jewish,

but you're not practicing the rites, or the culture, or the things that you're supposed to follow.

Now, this is directly opposite to the "orthodox". Orthodox means by the strict letter. "Strict"

means you follow exactly what it says. So, if someone tells you they're orthodox, they're

orthodox Jewish, or they're orthodox Muslim, or they're orthodox Christian - we're talking

about a completely different creature. You've got to respect where they come from. Don't

have to follow it, but you have to respect that they're going to see it differently.

And if I'm speaking to you and you happen to be orthodox, please respect the non-practicing

ones, because they believe in what you're doing; they just don't feel that that's their

lifestyle. Right? Live and let live, I say. Okay? Anyway.

Let's go to here: "How". We talked about the leaders, and we talked about the different

types of religion, and if they're orthodox, regular... And "regular" just means you go

to church, follow some of the rules, but not all of them. Okay? But let's talk about how,

because people believe in God or love their God in different ways. Some people "meditate".

"Meditating" means to focus on something, maybe, love, God, or what have you, and just

think about that contemplatively. Okay? Another word for that for some people are "contemplate".

They contemplate God. They just think: "God, God, God", and try to get closer to God. "Pray".

I like this one, because this is when you talk to God and you tell God the things you

want, or you ask God to help other people and make the world a better place, or just

trying to have God talk to you and communicate with you. So, you usually close your eyes,

and you talk to God and have a conversation. All right?

"Read". The Bible, or the Torah, the Quran sometimes are called "scripture". Scripture.

"Script" meaning written, written book. Some people read the Bible every night, or the

Torah, or the Quran, they read it, and they try and understand it, and this is how they

get in touch with God, because these are the words of God, and God is communicating through

the words. And other people, they go to church, and they "sing" and they "clap".

[Sings and claps].

Yeah, okay. If you recognize "Old MacDonald". Anyway, so they sing, and they

clap, and: "Hallelujah, Lord. Hallelujah!" Yeah. All are fine, because when it comes

down to it, we got to learn to understand and respect each other's different ways of

wanting to touch things that we can't see or understand completely. Or if we don't want

to believe, respect the fact that not everybody wants to come to your party. Right? You're

having one, some people want to come; some don't.

And if anything, with this lesson, what I want you to be able to do is: to talk to each

other in a way that shows respect; ask people not always about religion, but faith and belief;

maybe ask them: "How do you show respect for your deity?" And "deity" is another word for

God. Right? There's Zeus was a deity, there's God, there's Allah, they're deities; gods.

How they show respect to them, where they show that respect. You can even ask about

their leaders, and what good words or wise words their leaders had given to them. And

if they follow, how well do they follow? Are they just regular Joes that go to church once

a week and they try to do the best they can? Are they non-practicing:

"Yeah, I'm Christian, but not really. I don't do anything." Or they're orthodox:

"Hey, there's a book, there's a reason for the book - I follow the book."

Talk. Communication is the best thing we have.

Right? That's why you're here, learning English. Not a lesson on religion, but a lesson on

using English effectively to get greater communication so you can be [snaps] like a native.

Anyway, that's James for today, and we're going to go to my messed up ending.

Are you ready? If you want to do... You know, watch the video again or

go see other videos that we do on communication on the website,

please go to www-right-eng as in English, vid as in video.com (www.engvid.com)

where there'll be this video and others you can watch, and do quizzes for.

So, once again, I'm going to say thank you very much, don't forget to subscribe.

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