When a religious group puts there religion before their God, that's when things start bubbling up over the pot of doom. Really, when any group puts their traditions, rituals, and bureaucracy before it's original or foudning purpose, that's when things get ugly.
What's wrong with the "religious right" is their religion, not their God.
More and more Christians are throwing off the chains of religion. When I was younger I used to wear a shirt that said Free from Religion on the back in big, bold letters. Christians more and more are calling themselves Jesus Followers. If you ask people if they're religious many will answer, "I'm not religious, but I am a Christian."
I am a Christian. When I was about two years old my mother decided she wanted to try out church. She liked it, so she asked my father to go. He said he'd give it a chance. He said he'd go to church for a few months and if anything changed, maybe he'd consider more months.
More and more months later, they were still going to church. Something had spoken to them, reached out to them, beckoned them to stay longer.
My father always says he never went to church except for weddings and funerals. My mother was mostly the same. Neither of them grew up with religion or God or Christianity. So I grew up with brand new Christians who'd never been indoctinated and had no strong ties to tradition. What I grew up knowing was simply what was written in the Bible.
A few years ago, in my sophomore year of college, I was in a literature class and we began speaking of the Eucharist. Everyone seemed to know what it was and it had something to do with Christianity. I had to raise my hand and ask what it was only to find out that it was a fancy word the Catholics game to the communion bread. I also found out that Catholics believe they actually cosume Christ's body and blood.
All this was new to me. I started doing more research. I found out that Easter was originally (and to some extent still is) a pagan holiday celebrating the spring fertility goddess Eostre (spellings vary). I found out that in pagan Zoastrianism their god Zoaster, the sun god, was born on Decemeber 25. His holy day was Sunday. I found out all sorts of things I had never known and had never read in the Bible.
If we Christians threw away our indoctrinated selves. If we threw out our traditions and started asking why we do what we do, then maybe we'd start believing in God again. Maybe the "religious right" would reevaluate some of their methods and ideas.
I'm thankful for my upbringing because we were always allowed to ask questions. What we knew, we learned from the Bible and not some priest or preacher. I'm thankful because I feel my upbringing has allowed me the opportunity to have a purer Christian understanding than most.
I don't mean this to offend, but Christianity is just a household phrase these days. Anyone who goes to a Christian church says they're a Christian. But a Christian is one who truly believes that Jesus Christ is who he said he was. It's as simple as that. You don't have to go to church and going to church doesn't mean you're a Christian.
So it is with the "religious right." From what I can gather, they seem to be concerned with their religion more than with their God. They'd rather tell God what they want than listen to what He has to say. They're perfectly fine doing every ritual and reteaching their doctrines without asking any questions about why they do what they do.
In closing, I daresay those on the "religious right" may not be Christians at all. They've put their religion before their God and insodoing put what God has to say aside. Perhaps they've quit believing in God and and started believing in themselves and their wonderful creation: religion.
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Comments: 19
Just a point to think about. I am going to take a modern phase and ask one question with it.........WHAT WOULD JESUS DO? With today's preachers, put them in their places, just like He did then. It is not what a man says that makes him a Follower {Christian} [which is a term given to the followers by Ceasar Nero & not a good term], but rather that which is in his heart!
They will look upon you with great pity and lament the fact that you will burn in hell for eternity for such talk.
I agree with Kevin in that we do not need Religion to follow the teachings of Christ.
"The Kingdom (of Heaven) is inside you and it is outside you
"Split a piece of wood, and I am there
"Lift up the stone and there you will find me
The Gospel of Thomas
I remember when the progressive left and Democrats used to be the center of tolerance rather than a source of hate and divisiveness. It is time to go back to your roots folks, and quit dabbling in hatred.
Just for the record, I am not a christian, I am, in the truest definition of the word, an atheist.
It is not helpful, though, to denigrate the faith of people who find in a church community the strength, wisdom, compassion and comfort to continue their personal growth.
Most of the people I know who go to church are there just to socialize or to make themselves look good in the community. Most of them know very little about the bible.
Here where I live, the big churces dominate the politics of the community. They are the first to vote down liquor sales, and can be found drunk as monkeys at the country club the very next day.
Unfortunately, any message of "love and peace" from any of the major religions is so tainted with misogyny and xenophobia that any rational person must reject it.
Spirituality is your personal relationship to the diety in whatever form that diety takes. It is working to perfect your own soul and fix your own imperfections. It's giving back freely without thought of recompense because it seems right. Since your path and that of someone else is probably never going to be the same, nobody but you can set your rules.
Joan: have you ever noticed that you can find bible verses to justify about anything you decide you wish to do if you look and interpret enough? That's what many of the hate groups do. I firmly believe we each have a little voice that tells us right from wrong. It is only when we stop listening or listen to someone else tell us what our voice is saying that we stray from the right path. We all know what we should do. The tough part is paying attention and doing it.
As a matter of fact, almost all so-called Christian traditions were based on pagan beliefs that existed for thousands of years before there was any guy named Jesus.
To make their new religion more palatable for everyone the newly created Christians used the pagan holidays as they continued to be celebrated by the general populace. The newly created holidays were given new names and new legends, but were added on top of the existing pagan holidays so as to make it easier for the majority of people - who at that time were all pagans of some type - to accept.
When you talk about eating the body of Christ and drinking his blood all I can think of is vampires and werewolves. I find the thought of eating someone particluarly disgusting. It's amazing how alot of indoctrination can make just about anything palatable.
And most importantly, what we call the bible today was originally a bunch of stories - created way before people could read or write - told by the oral historians of the time - we call them "bards" or "griots", etc, - they used to travel from town to town bringing news and stories that were told over and over again.
In fact, the bible as we know it today was not written down until 50-80 years after the death of Jesus... which means that no one living at the time of Jesus actually wrote anything down about him. They told stories as they travelled around. These stories were repeated and repeated to glorify their subjects. Many of hte stories and songs from the time name specific people as these stories real purpose was to glorify the subject of the story.
Have you ever played the game 'Telephone?" The story changes each time it is told. The bards and griots owed their safe passage to the rulers of each territory they entered so they had to tell stories that the PTB approved of. Knowing this simple truth, how can any reasonable thinking person ever believe the words in the bible are literal truth? I find this denial of reality completely mind-boggling.
But what I find more mind-boggling is this blind obediance to the idea of religion. And the way the religous right has misused their own religion to advance their racist and religionist POV... they are against a woman's right to choose what happens with her own body, yet they think killing people via capital punishment is a fine idea. They'll allow a living woman to die if her fetus might kill her due to pregnancy problems, yet they don't seem to consider the living woman's right to life. It's all insane thinking using the cover of religion as if it could prove them correct. When all it does is prove them to be irrational.
IMHO religion has done much more bad than it has good. And that goes for all religions all over the world. Just think of all the wars that might not have been fought if not for so-called religious differences.
But most of all, religion - all of them - has no place in governing.
I believe that the problem has long stemmed from governments use of religion as a tool to control the masses. What better way to push an agenda than at Sunday morning service and coming from someone who is supposed to be a conduit for Gods word? For thousands of years religion has been used as mass crowd control.
At some point we, as the human race, will come to realize that God, god, Budda, Allah, whatever, are all the same thing. The most important part of all religion is that it should teach you to be a better person...period.
Every person's path to God is different, so our perspective of God will be different.
No one has the same relationship with their mom, that they do with their dad, that they do with their sister, that they do with their best friend. So why do we expect God to be so one dimensional? Because the easiest way to validate your own views is to convince someone else of them. This is power. This is religion.
Religion, to me, is a fundamental truth about reality and God. In my view, spirituality is ones attachment to religion without using rituals as a crutch.
The way I see it, it is the confusion of rituals and the church with religion that causes so many of the problems we encounter today.
It does seem that many people need the guidelines afforded by having numerous rituals in practicing their faith. But, we must keep in mind that these rituals are not the faith itself, merely a formality.
As an artist I like rituals, given they are performed well! I do not live with 'believes'. There are lessons that try to interpret the physical world, the social relationships and the world of our thoughts and feelings. There are iconical metaphors that of what they show and of what is hidden. But I never take all that in its litterary sense. Also I think that over the centuries, being the priests' cast a powerful elite, has wrtitten about those universal, pan-human archetypes in a way that suited and suits their purposes, their control, their power through fear imposed. One has to find the god in the little grass, in the power of the bird's song, in one's heart and be always careful and aware of the lies that people sell as holly truth that serves only their power interests!
I assume you have heard of the ILLIAD? The Illiad is used as a "credible" source for greek history. We teach it in schools as FACT. First copy of the ILLIAD was found well over 500 years after its pen date. Same can be said for Josephus' Roman history. Once again another work of "history" that is taught everyday as fact.
So lets not quite go down the road of the game of Telephone. Because if we do its a slipper slope indeed.
Thanks to all the posters on this article. Good Stuff!
I agree that the game of telephone is irrelevant for various reasons but the big one is it is done in fun with no effort to correct error at any point. That would spoil the game whereas a believer passing religious doctrine would get feedback and reaffirm carefully that the person had heard and learned what he was told!
However, the gospels, excepting John, do not purport to be written by Jesus contemporaries. And one of the most influential of the writers of the New Testament, Paul, was not converted until after Christ was dead! The fact remains that the new testament was not assembled until the Council of Nicea in 325, nor was it determined exactly what the church did believe since there was difference of opinion. That was the reason the Council was called. This was done because Constantine wanted a fixed doctrine before he became a member of the church and melded it into his government.
Paul was, of course, the original poster boy for misogyny! He did not have much use for women! But despite Paul's personal shortcomings, the church is indebted to him for it's ultimate growth as he moved it out of being a Jewish splinter group! Luke, by his own statement, wrote his book purely to convert another person, scarcely an objective account of things.
What did Jesus claim he was? There is no unanimity on this issue as there were two different viewpoints at the time of the Council of Nicea. What most Christian churches believe today is the result of the side that "won" there.
To me "Christian" means a person who believes that the man, Jesus Christ, lived, and attempts to study, emulate or otherwise follow the general teachings of this man. Many so called "Christians" have their own, more exclusionary definition of just what constitutes a Christian and usually has something to do with believing just like they do!
If one studies you can determine where many of the rituals and practices originated and the why as well. Tradition can be a great comfort to many and those who totally reject it actually make a "tradition" out of their rejection! The original Christians did not celebrate Christmas but about 300 years down the line they wanted to do something about that pesky group of sun worshipers who celebrated the Winter Solstice and by baptizing that approximate day they were able to convert it to Christian. No one claims Christ was born in the middle of the Winter!
Good article, thanks!
Kathleen, I must take issue with something you say:
... "as soon as you say to some that you are a Christian, they immediately put you in the box of 'religious right' and that's where all communication ends. So, its not only the fault of those who do indeed put their religion before their faith, it
is also the fault of those who are narrow-mindedly completely anti-Christian."
Wouldn't it be more the fault of those Christians who have allowed the so-called "religious right wing" to voice their policies as the policies of all Christians without any more reasoned response from the more centrist Christians? I mean, really, isn't it your responsiblity to not allow a small group of people to speak for you and your religion? It's not the reponsibility of outsiders who don't believe in or understand your religion to define it.
I remember a time when it was the Christians themselves who fought for the things that the so-called left does today. Didn't the Berrigan brothers stand up for peace? I don't understand why Jesues preached peace, yet today so many who call themselves Christians preach exactly the opposite. Today Christians seem to be all for war anywhere any time, more guns, killing everyone on death row DNA be damned. Those things seem to me to be counter to the true Christian message, don't you think?
If a group doesn't like the way they are perceived, isn't it their responsibility to make sure that changes?
i think the religious right-wing promotes their policies under their definition of christianity. not the view of all christians. the difference is small, but profound. you see, i think that much of mainstream christianity--that is, the majority of christians--actually do embrace the extreme conservative position.
right now there is a new movement among christians to break away from this. there is an 'emergent church' movement that is stunning i think. but it is still small. the moment a christian says anything that can percieved by the 'religious right' as unchristian, they are attacked and labeled.
since this voice is in the minority, it is hard to rise up and claim it as the true voice of christianity.