Thanks for posting that Todd (especially the clarifier). Personally, I am most interested in the philosophy of buddhism, and am fairly well acquainted with the origins and the evolution of the legends surrounding the figure Boddhidarma, as well as the concept of enlightenment. This is to say that it sometimes bugs me that people tend to interpret Buddhism as a series of religious rituals. Not that the rituals themselves bug me, but the misconceptions involved, one of which you've pointed out.
On that note, are you interested in any particular strand of Buddhism or school of thought? Just curious.
As can thus be expected, you've pretty much cut straight to the quick without all the higgledypiggledy of interpreting the nature of the gods themselves (which is what I'd do, but I'd perhaps still like to see some words exchanged about that too). That is to say you've discussed the applicability of "pluralism" on a more cognitive, moral level. But that's not what the definition of pluralism actually entails. We're talking more about compatibility here- which IMHO is more useful. The problem though is that even talking on this level does not engage with 'core beliefs' of any of the religions themselves, because all require 'faith' and some degree of abandonment to an external entity in the complete belief that they exist.
I wrote in a separate thread that within a religion, things would go far more smoothly were a respect for differences in the peripheral concerns to be observed. But you're right, fundamentalist denominations/sects tend to deny this possibility. That said, given that I've explained that each religion holds an absolute insistence on the (exclusive) correctness of their core beliefs (like the fundamentalist sects hold an insistence on the correctness of their interpretation of doctrine in its entirety), we're back at the original question that spawned the notion of pluralism!
That's why it makes most sense to me to comment and provide dialogue as an agnostic (but not an atheist). There's a great deal of commonality and as of late, I have been noticing more parallels between the tenets of Christianity (as I know it) and the philosophy of Buddhism. To be simple about it, the essential difference to me is really the practice of faith. And that leads me to what I view as an inevitable compromise of sorts.
I've gone slightly off the track here, maybe I might create another thread to explore the area of the necessity of faith and spirituality. As for the thrust of this reply, I'm basically inviting you to go into some more detail as to how you think your views might be acheivable.
