AHC: in U.S. in 1920s, Buddhist ideas compete with Spiritualism?

From a documentary, "Birth of a Nation" pushed all the right buttons: an innocent and beloved victim, a villain easy to hate, the perception of arrogant wrongdoing on the part of the villain, a government totally ineffectual to do anything about it, another potential victim at risk, and then the "redeemers" riding like calvary complete with live orchestra music.
 
Spiritualism came out of the ferment of the Second Great Awakening, and was based on the idea that direct communication with angels or the dead was not incompatible with Christianity. Even though many Christian denominations rejected such things, not all did. Then it was combined with later trends that spiritualism could be scientific and that such science could be reconciled with Christianity. While some elements of Spiritualism would develop in explicitly non-Christian ways, most of the time adherents could argue their beliefs were not incompatible with Christianity. It wasn't like Theosophy which clearly diverged from established Christian teachings.

Buddhism couldn't do that. People know it is a distinct religion. Furthermore, the major reason for the rise of spiritualism in the 1920s was the result of all the dead in WWI. Communicating with your lost loved ones was a major factor. It wasn't a curiosity about different religions in general. Buddhism doesn't offer anything like that.

You'll need some really weird PODs to make it happen.
 
Spiritualism came out of the ferment of the Second Great Awakening, and was based on the idea that direct communication with angels or the dead was not incompatible with Christianity. Even though many Christian denominations rejected such things, not all did. Then it was combined with later trends that spiritualism could be scientific and that such science could be reconciled with Christianity. While some elements of Spiritualism would develop in explicitly non-Christian ways, most of the time adherents could argue their beliefs were not incompatible with Christianity. It wasn't like Theosophy which clearly diverged from established Christian teachings.

Buddhism couldn't do that. People know it is a distinct religion. Furthermore, the major reason for the rise of spiritualism in the 1920s was the result of all the dead in WWI. Communicating with your lost loved ones was a major factor. It wasn't a curiosity about different religions in general. Buddhism doesn't offer anything like that.



You'll need some really weird PODs to make it happen.

Like I sais earlier(I think), the best bet is probably to get Buddhist doctrine wrapped up in ostensibly Christian garb, even if the content itself is way more Buddhist than it is Christian.

Ouright reincarnation might be too much for mainstream America to swallow, but maybe if it was framed along the lines of Mormonism's different levels of the afterlife, so the various reincarnation-cycles aren't all taking place on the same planet, it would be a bit more palatable.

And I think the 2nd Great Awakening would indeed be a promising starting point. Let's say a Jesuit from Quebec, schooled in eastern thought, takes a year-long trip to the Holy Land, where he then claims to have had a series of mystical visions, revealing supposedly original insights sounding(to the educated) like the Four Noble Truths etc. He then moves to New England, gets himself quickly defrocked, and proceeds to hit the 1830s snake-oil circuit preaching his evangel. The fact that he claims to have gotten his revelations in the Holy Land, and that he gives it all an ostensibly Christian title, adds to his credibility. Mainstream evangelicals start a cottage industry exposing the Buddhist-inspired heresies of the new faith.
 
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