The Socio-Political History of Organized Religion, Part III

Executive Papers, Guest Post Comments (4)

Guest Essay by B.R.

“So potent was religion in persuading to evil deeds.” – Lucretius

If your leader feels like raiding the village at the other end of the valley because he’s tired of all the women in his village then he simply says they worship a false god and your god wants them punished. If someone’s running around and speaking against either church or state they get branded as a heathen or a heretic and rather quickly find themselves hung up, cut up, locked up, or burned up depending entirely on the period of history and the inclination of the society. Find a nasty cult of monotheists taking root in your strictly pagan culture? Round the bastards up and toss ’em to the lions in the arena or, if you’re Nero,’ dip ’em in wax and use them as candles at your next house party. If you feel that the encroaching Muslims are a threat to the iron grip you have had on Europe for the last several centuries you simply round up a few kings and tell them that God said to raise some armies and deal with the problem, then watch as it turns into 250 years of bloodshed and slaughter across Europe and the Middle East. Not a one of these things is considered right or good yet people have quite enthusiastically supported every last one of them.

Those of you that belong to an organized religion or faith-based group of some sort take a moment and ask yourself why you belong to that particular one. Did you answer because it’s the one your parents belonged to and that’s just how you were raised? Were you exposed to other religions? Have you studied other faiths? Or did you simply, and blindly, accept what was fed to you as truth during your youth?

That is, after all, how the system is designed to work. Once they have you they encourage you to spread the faith to your friends, your family, and in many cases completely random strangers. And of course the version of the Bible used by your religion is the right one, not like that one used by everyone else. We all know that one was incorrectly translated by a team of lazy Greek scribes that liked to dance and then poorly edited by a drunken Roman that liked to play with little boys in his spare time when no one was looking. Ignore the fact that you’re really worshiping the same bloody God as everyone else, just in different ways due to differences in societal and cultural development. If you didn’t do that then who would the enemy be for you to rally against? Some useful suggestions are the destruction of the environment, uncontrolled population growth, disease, hunger, and any multitude of human rights issues.

Don’t delude yourself into thinking that missionary expeditions are, or have ever been, anything more than an extension of the great scam. If you spread the faith it provides a common bond and once there is a common bond the likes of religion it makes things in the political arena oh so much easier. And of course the more souls you save through conversion the better your place in Heaven right?

Times have changed. The Catholic Church is no longer The Church. The Pope is no longer appointing kings, nor is he being appointed by them. We no longer live in a world where belonging to The Church is just something that everyone does. Individuals now have any number of choices as to how to lead their spiritual lives, though Christianity and Islam still account for a large percentage of the global population.

Don’t get me wrong, religion and politics are still very much involved with one another in these modern days, though in the Western world it’s a bit more subtle than it was a few hundred years ago. The two will continue to be involved so long as the masses continue to let religion dictate so much of their lives. I don’t deny that religion has helped a great many people over the ages. Nor do I deny that there are always exceptions to the common rule, but in the end religion is what it is, a convenient and beautifully engineered way to exert influence and control over humanity. It gives them something to believe in, provides a set of rules by which to live, and the teachings are easily twisted to suit any given situation if one just thinks about it a moment.

I say this to Mr. Nagin and those like him, the individuals that willingly prey upon the religious beliefs of the masses – As leaders it is your duty to set an example. Lead not through fear, but through inspiration and motivation. Is a society filled with weak-willed sheep that do nothing more than stumble through their daily lives without really thinking about the world around them what we really want? Is that how we’re going to solve the great problems that plague our species? Or do we want a culture composed of strong-willed and free-thinking individuals that are not afraid to look beyond the little box that comprises their world and try new things, to innovate, to work towards creating a better world instead of contenting themselves with the sorry state of affairs we find ourselves in today?

To the masses that belong to organized religions I have this to say – Think about the teachings of your religion, really think about them. Examine them in detail. Then take a long, hard look at your organization. Don’t be afraid to think for yourself, to question your beliefs, and make informed decisions for yourself about your faith and how you practice it. A common theme among organized religions, as I have been told by those that belong to them, is tolerance. Don’t allow yourself to be led by the nose where government and politics are concerned simply because you’re told it’s what’s right. Decide for yourself if it’s right or wrong. Everything has shades of gray, even if you can’t quite see them at first. Your beliefs are not necessarily those of your neighbor, and to try and force them upon another through politics is a disturbing policy that needs to be discontinued. Do not preach tolerance to me in one breath and then with another go to the polls and vote against something for no other reason than the politicians appealed to your religious leanings and convinced you that your God said it was bad.

Not everyone believes in the same things. Not everyone chooses to practice their faith in the same way. The world we live in is a very diverse place now, much more so than it was in the days when religion dominated government almost absolutely. The two should be separate. Government should govern and stay out of spiritual matters just as organized religion should stay out of matters of governing and instead focus on the many internal problems that they presently face.

– B.R.

(Parts 1, Part 2)

Pieces And Parts @ March 23, 2008