Faith

I felt that the most outstanding point of Wednesday's class was the rhetorical question stated at the end of the lecture. Religion has always bothered me for that exact reason -- it preaches love and doing good yet it has caused so many deaths. When I think about this, I can only come up with two explanations for this phenomena. Either religion itself must be flawed in some way such that it causes people to act in this manner or people don't truly understand their religions and this confusion causes the negative actions that become tied to religion. Although I do not consider myself very religious I was born, baptized, raised and confirmed Episcopalian. I have never heard anything that encourages or even suggests negative action towards another human being. I also believe that most religions share fundamental views. Thus it makes it difficult for me to link the negative affects of religion to a "flaw in the system."

Instead, I have observed that it must be people who corrupt and pervert their own beliefs. People interpret religion to their own benefit or to justify their actions and in many circumstances this leads to negative effects. I believe that the negative impacts of religion are due to a flaw in human nature rather than a flaw in religion. People need meaning, guidance, and community -- religion is able to provide all three. Religion is necessary in our world and the suffering it has caused is a reflection of a flaw in "humanness." It is this flaw in "humanness" that makes us unique as an entity and to take that away would be worse than to take away our five senses. To conclude I would like to mention that it has been determined that there is a gene that predisposes humans to faith. Sit on that for awhile.