[Ads-l] buffet/cafeteria Catholics, Buddhists

Laurence Horn laurence.horn at YALE.EDU
Mon Mar 11 22:24:44 UTC 2019 

> On Mar 11, 2019, at 5:33 PM, Tim Stewart <timoteostewart1977 at GMAIL.COM> wrote:
> 
> Ha! Meze Muslim could work. Not so much the other one.

Yeah, I was pushing the envelope on that.  I was also looking for a "___ Jew”, but couldn’t think of the appropriate j-initial component.  “Dim sum Daoist” is a nice one!

> Maybe Luby’s
> Lutheran? How about Tapas Taoist? or Dim Sum Daoist? We could play this
> game a while. ;-)
> 
> I do know of the portmanteau term “lutepisc” (pun on “lutefisk”) which has
> been used by people who feel a connection to both the Lutherans and the
> Episcopalians, such as for the kids in a family where dad is a Lutheran and
> mom is Episcopalian, etc.

Surprised I never heard that one on Garrison Keillor’s show or in his books, unless I did and forgot.  

We could go with “Pot luck Presbyterian”, but are they really into that? Unitarians are, but then we lose the alliteration.

> 
> 
> On Mon, Mar 11, 2019 at 2:52 PM Laurence Horn <laurence.horn at yale.edu>
> wrote:
> 
>>> On Mar 11, 2019, at 2:22 PM, Tim Stewart <timoteostewart1977 at GMAIL.COM>
>> wrote:
>>> 
>>> Benjamin,
>>> 
>>> Not sure if you're only interested in the "catholic" variant, but I have
>>> "cafeteria Christian" back to 1966 and "cafeteria Christianity" back to
>>> 1988 in a blog post if you're interested in casting your net in that
>>> direction:
>>> 
>>> 
>> https://www.dictionaryofchristianese.com/cafeteria-christian-cafeteria-christianity/
>>> 
>>> I love "buffet Buddhist." New to me.
>>> 
>>> Tim
>>> 
>>> ⸻  ⸺   —    ‒    ‒    —   ⸺  ⸻  ⸺   —    ‒    ‒    —
>>> 
>> 
>> Meze Muslims?  Lutefisk Lutherans?
>> 
>>> 
>>> 
>>> On Sun, Mar 10, 2019 at 4:35 PM Barretts Mail <mail.barretts at gmail.com>
>>> wrote:
>>> 
>>>> I made no attempt to antedate “cafeteria Catholic”. Wikipedia has 1971
>> for
>>>> that and 1986 for “cafeteria Catholicism”.
>>>> 
>>>> Some of these instances of “buffet Buddhist” appear to be nonce.
>>>> 
>>>> 1.
>>>> 
>> https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2019/03/buddhism-meditation-anxiety-therapy/584308/
>>>> Why So Many Americans Are Turning to Buddhism
>>>> Olga Khazan
>>>> 7 Mar 2019
>>>> 
>>>> ——
>>>> Much like “cafeteria Catholics” ignore parts of the religion that don’t
>>>> resonate with them, some Westerners focus on only certain elements of
>>>> Buddhist philosophy and don’t endorse, say, Buddhism’s view of
>>>> reincarnation or worship of the Buddha. Call them “buffet Buddhists.”
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> The English OLD definition almost fits:
>>>> https://en.oxforddictionaries.com/definition/cafeteria
>>>> North American as modifier Denoting a system in which people may choose
>>>> from a number of available options, especially one in which an employee
>> may
>>>> select a personal package of company benefits.
>>>> 
>>>> Merriam-Webster has a similar definition:
>>>> https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/cafeteria
>>>> providing a selection from which a choice may be made
>>>> cafeteria benefit plan
>>>> a cafeteria curriculum
>>>> 
>>>> Wikipedia
>>>> https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cafeteria_Catholicism
>>>> The term cafeteria Catholic is applied to those who assert a Catholic
>>>> faith yet dissent from one or more doctrinal or moral teachings of the
>>>> Catholic church or who are viewed as dissenting by those using the term.
>>>> 
>>>> 2. http://www.lawrence.com/weblogs/patrickquinn/2006/jul/1/philemon/
>>>> 1 July 2006
>>>> Patrick Quinn
>>>> 
>>>> ——
>>>> Americanism is a formal expression of what's better known as "buffet
>>>> Catholicism": Many American Catholics walk down the serving line
>> sampling
>>>> only the doctrines they like, and pass over the rest in silence.
>>>> Americanism is hardly limited to North America or to Catholics. There
>> are
>>>> plenty of buffet Christians of all varieties, as well as buffet Muslims,
>>>> buffet Buddhists, buffet Jews and so on.
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> 3. http://www.byzcath.org/forums/ubbthreads.php/topics/72885/3
>>>> traveler
>>>> 25 September 2002
>>>> 
>>>> ——
>>>> Certainly when His Holiness the Dalai Lama denounced abortion as
>> contrary
>>>> to the life-affirming principles of Buddhism, the buffet Buddhists of
>>>> Hooie-wood experienced a dukkha day of Cecil B. Demille proportions.
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> 4.
>>>> 
>> http://newbuddhist.com/discussion/19198/disrespect-and-non-disrespect-towards-buddha
>>>> Shigo
>>>> July 2013
>>>> ——
>>>> Yeah I think theres a lot of buffet buddhists these days. Its not the 6
>>>> fold path with a side of "I'll do whatever I want”
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> 5. http://dontknowzen.com/the-death-of-zen-in-the-west-gone-too-soon/
>>>> Haven Tobias
>>>> 8 September 2018
>>>> ——
>>>> He concluded: the problem (?) with you people (?) is that you act as if
>>>> Buddhism is a buffet. Oh, zen moment! Bingo! Ka-ching! This was about
>> when
>>>> Barak Obama was saying: hey, if you want to call it Obamacare, that’s ok
>>>> with me. I said: hey, if you want to call us Buffet Buddhists, I’m going
>>>> with that. There are contemporary and there are ancient elements in
>> Buffet
>>>> Buddhism. There are American contributors, and English ones, but there
>> are
>>>> also Asian lights, like Thich Naht Hanh. Buffet Buddhism can take a
>> little
>>>> from Tibetan Buddhism, but leave the guru worship and the tantric magic
>>>> aside;
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> 6.
>>>> 
>> https://www.reddit.com/r/Buddhism/comments/1bru6g/not_believing_in_karma_and_prat%C4%ABtyasamutp%C4%81da/
>>>> therivverrat
>>>> five years ago
>>>> ——
>>>> Well, if there are "cafeteria Catholics, then why not "buffet
>> Buddhists"?
>>>> That is, who just take the parts they like?
>>>> ——
>>>> 
>>>> Benjamin Barrett
>>>> Formerly of Seattle, WA
>>>> 
>>>> ------------------------------------------------------------
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>>>> 
>>> 
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>> 
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>> The American Dialect Society - http://www.americandialect.org
>> 
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