October 1, 2005

• liberal religion?

  Interesting article: http://www.sulekha.com/expressions/column.asp?cid=305819

  Note that I do NOT 'endorse' the article at all... rather, I think that it is deeply flawed.  But anyway, here's part of the concluding paragraph from the article (with my comments below) :

  "The liberal adherents of all religions are now at the crossroads of a crucial choice. They can either remain silent and permit their fundamentalist minorities to fan the flames of religious conflicts, or speak out against them and insist on religious tolerance as the only legitimate road to a peaceful world."
  1. First, I think that the author is correct in this.  Liberals are indeed facing this choice.
  (Although I think it is interesting that he lumps 'fundamentalist Christianity,' which is involved in 'proselytization' simpy by means of telling other people about Jesus and encouraging them gently to consider His claims, together with with Al Qaeda, which is involved in killing civilians from nations that do not implement Islamic  Sharia law in a 'proselytization' by means of violence.  The author simply groups both of these together as "proselytizers.")
  2. Second, I find it amusing and oxymoronic that the author recommends the use of intolerance in the name of tolerance, in the typical blind postmodern way.  He says that liberals should "insist on religious tolerance as the only legitimate road".
  Notice that strident word, "insist", and that other annoyingly exclusive word, "only."

  I.e., playing the point of view of the author, "You MUST tolerate all other religions and cease trying to persuade other people that they're wrong.  If you behave otherwise, then YOU ARE WRONG, and I will have to INSIST that you stop, and mayhap, USE FORCE against you to ensure that you LEAVE ME ALONE (and leave others alone).

  Unfortunately, this posturing reeks of noxious postmodern hypocrisy.
  3. Finally, my personal opinion/prediction is that the world will indeed choose the 'non-proselytization' approach... The whole world will unite under one religion in the not-too-distant future, but that "one religion" will basically be composed of ALL of the former religions, with the one essential clause that "nobody shall be considered wrong if they believe differently" - the so-called (oxymoronic) "militant tolerance" that the article's author espouses.  The 'new world religion' will be a collage of all the old ones (except for Christianity).

  What about Islam?  That remains a fascinating question, because it would seem that Muslims (~a whole billion of them) are also passionately monotheistic and proselytizistic...  I am guessing that either Islam will split (one part becoming liberal and 'tolerant', and the other part uncompromising), or that some great world leader/prophet-figure will arise, manage to convince the vast majority of Muslims that he is Jesus Christ returned as the Quran predicted, and unite all the Muslims under the new world religion.
  (two other interesting slightly-related articles: http://www.hinducounciluk.org/artdetails?rec=82  and  http://answering-islam.org.uk/Authors/JR/Future/index.htm [ the appendix is cool ])

  • 9:23 pm
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