Look Out

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I’ve never had much use for religion. My parents were not religious. It wasn’t that we were atheists. We had some sort of generalised belief that there was something more than this. It just seemed wrong to deny that there was more than this life we have. Like we would be eliminating the idea of possibilities. Even so, I am still a person raised in the West, and Judæo-Christian framing is part of my world view, if only because it has been the one I’ve been most often exposed to.
I was also raised in a relatively nonjudgmental fashion (who are you to think you’re better than they are?), and I’ve been grateful for that, though to say I am unbiased and nonjudgmental would be a lie. Life after you grow up shapes you in ways you never expected, but if your parents do the job right, they instill you with values that will carry you through your life if you choose to listen to them.
The unfortunate part is that we’re not all instilled with the same values. Unfortunate not because one set of beliefs is inherently better than another, but because we’re all stupid enough to think that our beliefs are better than the other guy’s and we’re willing to back it up with force. In their benign forms, all the world’s religions are about tolerance and understanding and living within the law of humanity so that we can grow and live lives of peace. If you are a person of faith living in that context, all the power to you. It’s a source of great strength, I’m sure.
Look at us, though. We’re all in the process of swallowing our tongues while someone offers us a glass of water. It’s a holy war so that we can live in peace and freedom, and we’re on the right side. God is on our side because we have the right religion. Which religion? Fundamentalist Christianity and Islam bear little difference from each other. Each side continues to ramp up the rhetoric and the oppression, forcing ever-more-rigid interpretations of scripture that gives no one a chance to take a step back and compromise gracefully. Americans put bible code on their rifle scopes, and their opponents believe paradise and virgins await them in death. But we are fighting because our world is shrinking. The peaceful ideas of faith continue to be used to justify aggression.
Posted: February 5th, 2010 under Discussion.
Comments: 2











When I was a young man, I thought being book smart made me smart in life, but I was absurdly stupid about the latter. Much of my life has been spent on my own and social interaction is something I find challenging to this day. I’ve never quite found my comfort spot, but at this point I’ve made my peace with that part of my character and more or less accept what I am and what I am not.