When you're a jet, you're a jet all the way-- or are you?

“When you’re a Jet, you’re a Jet all the way from your first cigarette to your last dying day” go the lyrics of the famous song from the classic American musical, Westside Story. That seems to be akin to the popular attitude with westerners towards religion. If you are Jewish, Christian, or Muslim, you subscribe exclusively to that faith, any taint of belief in similar concepts such as Karma is to Buddhism as Providence is to Christianity results in conservative religious fundamentalists denouncing those who believe in false scripture, in spite of existing similarities.

But come over to the Asia Pacific region, especially in Southeast Asia and Japan, it is a different story altogether. Historically, many traditions reveal that the understanding of the world in both Southeast Asia and Japan did not distinguish between the sacred and the profane, as spirituality was part of their everyday life. Such spiritual traditions are varied and diverse.

One example shows how shamans and ancestral worship are important, such as going to shamans to communicate with ancestral spirits in order to find out what makes grandma so angry that she takes it out on the family by preventing a young couple from bearing any children. Another important example are rites and rituals such as mamemaki in Japan that is celebrated on the day of setsubun, setsubun referring to the day just before the beginning of each new season, and mamemaki performed by throwing soybeans out the door to cast away evil spirits from the previous season and prevent new ones from coming into the next. Most noticeably even today is the penchant for spiritual protection in the form of amulets and other lucky charms which people carry around for good luck or protection. But what happened to these when the advent of exclusive religions such as Christianity came when Europeans did, as well as the attitudes of little or no tolerance for traditional beliefs and superstitions?

Some current arguments show that in these cultures, there is no separation of culture and religion, because religion is part of their culture; it was what defined their outlook on life and was the basis of all their activities, from music in sacred rituals to government structure, such as the way Cambodia’s Angkor Wat temple was built to replicate the cosmic home of the Gods. So even when you have a high concentration of Islam in Indonesia or Christianity in the Philippines (yet some superstitions still remain especially in the form of amulets for good luck), how does this work out?

Here’s the thing: those beliefs never left with the arrival of the religions of the west. There is a western misconception that these traditional belief systems worship a wide pantheon of gods and do not respect the authority of a supreme deity above all, which is actually far from it.

The issue is not really a matter of inconsistent spiritual practices and religious beliefs, but a matter of definition and level of involvement. In the West, people tend to view religion as synonymous with the institutions that represent it and thus can eliminate it from their daily lives since they can separate themselves from it due to separation of the sacred and profane, especially with people feeling a greater attachment and more relief from the Almighty Dollar or science as a way of explaining how things work or even manipulating nature. Coupled with the fact people don’t feel too happy about church on Sundays asking for donations and thus taking away money, their source of comfort and society’s life blood, we can see why the spiritual realm of the gods has a limited role in society, even though the dollar says, “In God We Trust.”

Back East, however it is another story. An interesting discovery pointed out by UCLA history professor Herman Ooms shows that in a consensus of religions in Japan, 140% of the population are listed as Buddhist. Where does the other 40% come from if 100% is supposed to be the entire population? The answer is quite interesting: people checked off more than one box identifying which religion they felt they were, and the majority felt sympathetic towards Buddhism, practiced Shinto rituals, and got married in western-style Christian weddings. So interestingly enough, a person who checked off these three choice can theoretically be practicing three religions, which is difficult for a westerner to fathom if he believes that religion is a set path to meeting the Supreme Being, and we can only walk one path, not multiple.

In the value system back East however, this is not what religion is, since there is a very thin line between religion and culture as noted earlier. Though difficult to convey, essentially there are categories of importance in terms of spirituality that all fall under the overall belief system of these societies. Fellow history professor at UCLA Geoffrey Robinson on a visit to Indonesia wondered how a Muslim family in Indonesia was able to practice a ritual that could essentially be classified as ancestor worship in spite of the popular understanding that Islam was a strict religion with no tolerance like its brother Christianity. To the family who explained this to him, they felt that it had no conflict with Islam at all, that it was simply a part of their tradition to honor their ancestors. The key word here is “tradition.” Much like the Chinese in Hong Kong who use Feng Shui to make use of the sacred geometry of the universe for luck and prosperity who find nothing wrong with their conscience on the way to church Sundays, these practices would best be understood as traditions or superstitions in western eyes. Professor Herman Ooms, on a trip to Japan before, once asked a lady if they actually believed in the rituals they practiced, in going to graveyards for people to pay respect to ancestors, or in the good luck charms that people buy. Her response said it all about religion and culture: “Do you believe in Santa Claus?”

In a sense, people become too attached to tradition that it loses meaning, much like going to church becomes routine and it is no longer a spiritual day that reminded people of the powers that be. Why is Sunday in the United States a day when banks are closed and people somehow feel lazier than any other day of the week? Why does it seem weird to open up a drawer in a motel or hotel and not find a Bible placed by the Gideons? It is when the religion becomes so enmeshed in the culture that the culture takes it in without needing the religion to justify or explain it, since it becomes the norm.

Pay attention the next time you go to Borders bookstore and look by the cashier to see such novelties such as Buddha-in-a-box or a miniature Zen garden and more to decorate your desktops as well as offer a little more enlightenment. Why be a Jet when you can be whomever you want to be and reap the benefits of it all, just like the Japanese and most people in Southeast Asia do?