All Great Religions can be philosophically represented as parts of a single “comprehensive general design of total interconnectedness,” as I put it in my earlier posted entry Judaeo-Christian Tradition. Now, there is overwhelming evidence that religion has been a great divider of humanity, as history surely teaches us. And yet, coming from the same Divine Source, aren’t all religions parts of one family, which might leave us with some hope that blood is thicker than water, and when push comes to shove they can all be reconciled and start helping each other in healing the scars of by now mostly political hatreds?
…Reconciled? God, Adam and Eve! Cain and Abel! Noah’s sons! Ishmael’s plight! Jacob and Esau!, to leaf through just the first forty pages of the voluminous Holy Book... Some family values! The case is even more sordid on the larger scale of different conflicting religions, once again according to the Bible itself. Such are the facts of history, religion, and life.
Yet, hope defies fact, and often the truth itself. There is something more and better about families, no matter what we are reading in the Bible. In other words, a family is a family! As for the world’s great religions, God’s inspiration, which is the common source of all true religions, does make them all one family, and it is up to the leaders of the conflicting religions, who deal in hope, rather than fact, to teach their flocks that hate, like love, is in most cases a matter of attitude. Where there is a lingering hatefulness, love can come in its place, if only religion were willing to do its job. Whereas human wickedness is a matter of personal choice, and there is only so much that can be done about it, religious wickedness is a matter of collective choice, which choice is controlled by the religious leaders. Thus, they must not shirk from their personal responsibilities in turning public attitudes into proper channels, stressing inter-religious family ties, rather than inter-religious animosities…
After all, blood is thicker than water…
…Reconciled? God, Adam and Eve! Cain and Abel! Noah’s sons! Ishmael’s plight! Jacob and Esau!, to leaf through just the first forty pages of the voluminous Holy Book... Some family values! The case is even more sordid on the larger scale of different conflicting religions, once again according to the Bible itself. Such are the facts of history, religion, and life.
Yet, hope defies fact, and often the truth itself. There is something more and better about families, no matter what we are reading in the Bible. In other words, a family is a family! As for the world’s great religions, God’s inspiration, which is the common source of all true religions, does make them all one family, and it is up to the leaders of the conflicting religions, who deal in hope, rather than fact, to teach their flocks that hate, like love, is in most cases a matter of attitude. Where there is a lingering hatefulness, love can come in its place, if only religion were willing to do its job. Whereas human wickedness is a matter of personal choice, and there is only so much that can be done about it, religious wickedness is a matter of collective choice, which choice is controlled by the religious leaders. Thus, they must not shirk from their personal responsibilities in turning public attitudes into proper channels, stressing inter-religious family ties, rather than inter-religious animosities…
After all, blood is thicker than water…
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