The Start of Growth

The following is an excerpt from writings that started in the late 1980's. This was a time of disillusionment after witnessing what I considered injustice in the Church's I had been involved in.

These writings are my way of showing the world that I care, and I hope they might make a difference against all the injustices of the world.

I sit here watching the world go by. In Bosnia, Serbs kill Croats and Muslims, who go around killing each other; all in the name of God. In Ireland it is two Christian groups doing the killing, the Protestants and the Catholics.

Here in the United States we have groups like the Branch Davidians who were willing to die, or even let their children be molested for one man who claims to talk God. Jews fight Jews over the fact that Israel plans a peace agreement with the PLO who are an Islamic Arab people.

There are White supremacist groups which consider themselves Christians, who beat and kill anyone who do not agree with them, or are of a different ethnic group.

As for me, being a Christian, I am appalled. Christ preached love and redemption, not hate and killing. Even among the Churches there is hate and bitterness just because there is no agreement on what the Bible says. People have a tendency to take bits and pieces, and put them together in a way to suit their own beliefs.

When the Churches spend their money to help the less fortunate, instead of building bigger and better Churches they will be on the way to what Christ wanted. We do not need to condemn people for what they wear to Church, or how much they can afford to tithe. We should look their souls. By saying we must look to their souls I don't mean preaching hellfire and brimstone. I believe that the hope of Christ’s message is what should be what is sent to the world. When other people can tolerate the differences in belief and race then the world will be a better place.

After September 11^th, 2001 I am compelled to come back to the subject of tolerance. As I sit here reading my last article on this subject I realized that I sound as judgmental as the people I am writing about. I am sorry for that. I have my own faults that I struggle with from day to day. After the death of so many I have been forced to look at my own life and see my lack of faith in God, and my weaknesses. Some of this writing comes from shying away from things happening in my own life, and trying to help the whole world, even though I felt helpless when it comes to the people who I love the most. I am sorry for that, and will try harder.

I am not a scholar of other faiths, but I do know that Christians, Moslem's, and the Jewish people all claim to worship the same God. We all like to claim the ultimate authority on what God wants for the world, and our people, but forget that God also teaches love and tolerance for others. The laws passed down to us from God are for each person to decide to obey or not, he will be the judge. Individuals should not interpret them and force their interpretation on others not of their faith.

The people with power, who fear the differences between individual faiths, races, or even those who think different than them prey on the weaknesses of the poor, uneducated, and oppressed to try to force others to their way of thought, or just hurt those that are different. There is no thought of right or wrong in these people, they just lash out at the world. By people with power, I mean the leaders of the individual churches, and communities, as well as world leaders. They all have an impact on those who feel powerless.

Where am I going with this? I am not certain yet. I know that we have to realize that the people involved in the current acts of terrorism are from countries that have large groups of people who feel that the American people are imposing our way of life on their society. Like the Christians the people of the Muslim faith have certain guidelines and even laws to live by. Our way of life, with its freedoms allows people to choose not to obey the laws of their faith. This is even made possible when the governments are more secular. This threatens the fundamentalist leaders’ control of the people, and causes them to lash out at those they fear.

The American way of life is not for everyone. It can open the door for self-destructive behavior, allowing people to use drugs, abuse alcohol and allows open expression of sexual behavior, which can cause an epidemic of sexually transmitted disease; this behavior can rot a society from the inside out. In America we are still trying to find ways to combat this without removing the freedoms that sponsor creativity, and technological advances in our society.

With freedom comes the responsibility to realize that our actions affect those around us. This includes our neighbors around the world with different lifestyles.

Well back to the original subject of tolerance. If the leaders of the Christian churches, can get together with those of other faiths and discuss what is the most common denominator of our faiths we may be able to tear down the barriers that cause the fear and hate.