Thank you for this reply. I actually agree with you (except in not being Buddhist): we should differentiate between Buddhism the organized religion and Buddhism

Thank you for this reply. I actually agree with you (except in not being Buddhist): we should differentiate between Buddhism the organized religion and Buddhism the spiritual practice. Unfortunately, too many people are only familiar with the latter - and only with a variant of the latter that is much cleaned up and stripped of its folksy roots and made palatable for Western consumption - and then transfer the positive feelings they have about that to the former.