In January 1902, Reverend Clarence Edgar Rice warned Americans of a religion that “both in theory and practice…degrades women,” practices “crass brutality” towards animals, and “goes hand-in-hand with vice…that blushes not at unspeakable practices.” Even more terrifying, this “cruel” and “pessimistic” tradition was making inroads in the United States through both immigration and the conversion of American citizens. Similarly, American newspapers during the Progressive Era warned of “the religion of gloom and melancholy,” being spread by debaucherous “priests of unutterable cruelty [who] traffick in human flesh.”
What was this terrible creed, with its awful priests? It was Buddhism—a tradition today often heralded in popular culture as the path to everything from a better professional career to world peace.
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