TW, I certainly didnt mean it to come across that buddhism is athiesm, must have explained myself badly there. but i am going to argue against your claim that buddhist believe in a higher power, because i dont and none of my teachers has ever described 'it' as being a higher power. we focus on how we are part of the world and that nothing is either above or below us in the spiritual sense. nothing influences us or has a power in that sense, we are the result and the source of causes and effects, theres no higher power at work. whats more, describing a higher power implies something unattainable for humans and i have always been encouraged to believe in the possibility of complete enlightenment for humans, that being the objective of our practice. it about seeing your real place in a whole and how you affect and are affected by that whole, i dont see any stratification going on, quite the opposite. :-)