Major religions of the world all have central themes that are very close to each other, especially in terms of the believer’s moral responsibility to the world around him/her and their reaction to it. Specifically, all major religions preach tolerance, kindness, charity, neighborly goodwill, patience, acceptance, and love. One would imagine that the more dedicated you are to these principles, the more you would practice them.Why is it, then, that the fundamentalists of the world’s religions are usually the ones that least express these ideals?
I see and/or experience this phenomenon almost daily. Either it is expressed in the news how some fundamentalists or another are raining hellfire and damnation on another group of people for not following their specific credo, or I am exposed to it as I interact with members of my family and people in the community who are “gung-ho for God”.
The thing is, these folks are disillusioned. They have conceptualized their role in the world to be the warriors for their cause, the knights in shining armor, the heroes of the town, charged with defeating evil, righting the wrongs of the world, and turning the unrighteous from the Dark Side back into the Light of Truth. The sad part is, they’ve missed the entire point and are, instead, tilting at windmills in a crack-fueled haze.
Most religious folks I know feel that their belief system propagates itself best by active promotion and display, whereas most writings seem to indicate that leading by example is the better method for changing the world. Certainly both tactics might be used if one feels it is necessary, but here’s the important point that everyone is missing — you cannot preach your talk until your own underwear is clean. In their zeal to quash the misdeeds and thoughts of the world, they have left their own lives and actions in disarray. In fact, more often than not, the very actions and words they use to promote their religion violate the very criteria that they are judging the world against.
This, my friends, is called a hypocrite, and it is far from being an endangered species.
Believing that you have been “saved” by your religion and your devious and evil actions against your god(s) have been eliminated, nullified, or otherwise rendered inactive does not exclude you from needing to continually evaluate yourself against the ruler of your beliefs to ensure that your actions and deeds are toeing the line.
For an example, let’s say Mary condemns Joan for not getting married to her boyfriend Jack because Mary believes that is a sin to live together and not be married. In fact, Mary goes so far as to shun Joan and Jack because of this. Mary has, in effect, turned evil herself by refusing to offer up acceptance, understanding, and love to Joan and Jack and instead chose to ignore her own actions simply to be able to rag on theirs.
There’s a few principles I think all religious folk should learn to live by, making them compatible with the major teachings of their religions and overall making them less of a burr in the eyesocket:
Principle One: You do not have a Free Pass – Whether your religion teaches that you are forgiven unconditionally, that your actions as a person will save your ass, or you are the chosen one of God and automatically get into heaven, this does not entitle you to act like a self-righteous jackass. God did not intend these provisions to be whipped out like an insurance card, snapped onto the countertop, and you, with a gleam in your eye, stating, “I don’t have to worry; I’m covered.” I fully believe that God will slam each and every one of you down on a hot, barbed spike, headfirst, when the time comes for being a pompous prick. Nothing makes you above your own code of morals and ethics, I don’t care how holy you profess to be.
Principle Two: Your responsibilities towards your religious tenants come before anyone else’s – The Bible said it best when it stated that you cannot remove a speck from a person’s eye before yoinking the chunk of 2×4 out of yours. Until your life is a golden gem of a wonder to behold, don’t start sawing on the person in line with you at the bank. People outside your religion look at you and automatically think, “Assssssshooooooole”, and shut down. They don’t give a rip-roaring whiddly-fuck what you have to say if you turn around and cheat on your taxes or get stupid-drunk and drive into a lightpole. Clean up your own act and keep it clean prior to messing with anyone else’s.
Principle Three: Don’t forget what sins are. You’re probably committing one right now. – The religiously fervent often tend to forget what things in the world are sins and instead revolve their life around a subset of wrongdoings designed to maximize their placement and devalue the worth of the targeted individual. “I haven’t cheated, murdered, or stolen — I’m a really great guy!” Right, and you’re also a pompous shithead — that’s a sin, too.
The fact is, intolerance, a lack of acceptance, excessive pride, being a know-it-all, being dumber than your capabilities, and refusing to see another side of an idea simply because you are stubborn are all sinful activities that are often shown by the religiously zealous. Yet they are loathe to mention these, lest their opportunity to verbally roger their neighbor is taken away. You cannot clean a sink full of dishes with a food-caked sponge.
Principle Four: Everyone else’s religious beliefs are just as valid as yours. – Religious beliefs are based on faith. Even non-religious beliefs have an element of faith, too, but they’re not the discussion here. Faith is, essentially, assuming something is true even if you do not have concrete evidence to prove it — you are emotionally affirming the unaffirmable. And when we say “unaffirmable”, we are meaning by normal, scientific methods. Your religious viewpoints are based on faith, and so is Jack’s, and Helen’s, and…well, you get the picture. So their belief systems are likewise unprovable by science, too.
Therefore, where is your common ground for saying that you are correct and they are wrong? The fact is, there isn’t a common ground — you can only judge Jack’s religion in the context of yours (which probably says that Jack is dead wrong) and Jack can only judge you through his. Since this is clearly bias, the comparisons are null and void — they don’t hold up in a logical contest. Thus, you must assume that your faith has just as much validity as Jack’s, or that neither of your faiths has any validity. It’s an ambiguous outcome either way.
This is very important, because there are so many people in the world today who have stated, “I’m right, you’re wrong” on issues that they cannot possibly prove, and yet they use this as their weapon of choice, the device that separates them from others. Nevermind that if the Christian was raised in a Hindu household they would have probably had the Hindu faith — no! I’m Christian, therefore I’m correct. This is clearly disillusionment.
This does not mean that religious people are not allowed to believe whatever they choose. Instead, it is simply pointing to the fact that since you cannot prove that your belief is the correct one, you must assume that any other belief may be the correct one and to give them the proper respect and acknowledgement that they deserve. It may turn out that nobody is correct — or everyone is. It is simply impossible to tell given that no religion has all the pieces of evidence necessary to make a concrete, logical conclusion.
The Future: A Dim Prospect for the Masses
The unfortunate aspect of all of this is that the situation is improving on some fronts and dissolving on others and there doesn’t appear to be a clear path to religious tolerance forming anytime soon. The phenomenon that I am seeing more often is that, although a large number of people are opening up to the idea that the religions of the world are all essentially the same basic principles, that their particular flavor might not be the chosen way, and that everyone deserves respect, there are also large groups of people who are digging their heels in deeper and pushing back much harder against these ideas of tolerance.
Humans are dizzy wreaks of illogical results about 75% of the time, easily persuaded by emotional and psychological manipulations. Fundamentalist religious groups have managed to imbue their members with a greater fear of the unknown and are pushing them to shun the principles that lead to logic, understanding, and acceptance, telling them instead that these things will cause them to lose their faith and all that they hold dear. In essence, they are terrorists of the mind, polluting the senses, striking fear into the hearts of their parishioners, and forbidding them from engaging themselves into the world they live in.
This will be an uphill battle for many years to come, perhaps always, and I can only hope (foolishly, perhaps) for the best and a turnaround of those folk who insist that their crap doesn’t stink like everyone else’s. Remember, Everyone Poops. Just because your poop is saved doesn’t mean mine isn’t as well.
