My body is not my temple

You hear it all the time: my body is my temple. But a temple cannot be home. The point of temples, shrines, churches is that they offer a place away from the ordinary business of life, somewhere to withdraw for reflection.

Life is - and must be - just full of things not generally acceptable in temples: eating breakfast, going to the bathroom, doing the laundry, laughing immoderately, falling in love, falling apart, falling asleep. Step away from this and reflect, sure, but then (and this is important) step back again into the fray.

The idea that it would be good thing to keep ourselves, and our lives, permanently temple-pure is poisonous because it recoils from engaging with the complex muck and magic of existence. While there is value in withdrawal and reflection, it is there to season a life, not to replace it. Just as monastic traditions season their supporting culture rather than offering a complete alternative.

We need to engage with all of life, perhaps especially with those of whom we disapprove. There's no other way to understand them or to make ourselves understood in turn. We are all standing together on this increasingly small world, and it does no good to judge and turn our backs. The people and behaviours we judge are still standing right there behind us: if they extinguish species, poison the seas or start wars, we don't get an exemption from the consequences.

We cannot sweep away the dirty world but we can infect it with our own outlook, if we get off our soapboxes. We need the courage to wade through a somewhat compromised life, putting aside the comforts of purity and blame.

Can we please drop this impossible aspiration to the temple? Without someone to translate and interpret, your temple life of purity and good example is unintelligible, unattractive, unattainable. Irrelevant.