Some of you know that I’m part of several interfaith groups
on Facebook that work to build relationships and bridges of understanding. In these groups, I am in regular conversation
with Muslims, Jews, Buddhists, and some who identify with other faiths.
From time to time we get a “troll,” which in internet slang
is a person who “sows discord by starting arguments or upsetting people, by
posting inflammatory, extraneous, or off-topic messages in an online community
with the deliberate intent of provoking readers into an emotional response…
often for their own amusement." [1]
In a group that’s trying to build interfaith bridges, people
tend to be very welcoming and open and try to give constructive feedback when
someone starts telling group members that those from different religious
traditions from the one posting won’t be “saved” or that they need to convert
to their tradition. Sometimes it’s hard to
tell for a while whether someone new is a “troll” or someone who is very
sincere and is from a religious tradition that has taught them that they need
to try to convert people who have different beliefs, to “save” them for
heaven/paradise and to save them from “hell”.
Maybe they truly don’t understand the purpose of the group. Perhaps they do have some understanding of
the group’s purpose, but they’re so convinced that their beliefs are the only
right ones that they feel righteous in telling people that their beliefs are
wrong or their scriptures are inferior.
After all, in their mind, they have the right beliefs and follow the
right religion, and they want that for everybody.
One of the books I’ve been reading lately is The Interfaith Alternative: Embracing
Spiritual Diversity, by Steven Greenbaum.
I’m hoping to review it more fully later. Fundamental to this book is the concept of
“right belief,” which the author says has been the organizing principle of our
spiritual paths for a very long time. If
many of us and many of our religious communities believe that we have the only
way, that we are the only chosen people, and that we follow the only right
spiritual path, the result can be distrust, hatred and violence.
In this book, Greenbaum offers an Interfaith alternative,
which respects each spiritual path and recognizes what we all share in
common: the call to love and to be loving and compassionate.
Greenbaum suggests “Maybe dividing ourselves into righteous
pockets of spiritual belief is not the best way to bring about love.” We humans are great at building walls between
ourselves and those who are different in some way. For too long, too many of us
have been stuck in a paradigm that demands that we search for or protect the
one “right belief,” I think Greenbaum is right when he says “Who
has the right belief?” is the wrong question, and that we need to be more
concerned with a different question: “How do we live as a result of our
beliefs?” We need to stop arguing about
which religious tradition is “best” or “right” or “true”, and find ways to be
in conversation with one another and to work together to honor God/Allah/Hashem
or whatever we call the One we worship, through works of compassion, mercy, and
justice.
For those who struggle with the question of “Who is
right?”and the desire to define God, Greenbaum offers several helpful ways of considering
an alternative. One of them is in the
Indian fable of “The Blind Men and the Elephant.” We had a picture book version of this at our
house when my son was young, and I bought a new copy recently. The story originated in the Indian
subcontinent and is widely known in many traditions, including Buddist, Jain,
Hindu, and Sufi Muslim traditions.
In various versions of the story, a group of blind men (or
people in the dark) touch an elephant to learn what it’s like. Each one feels a different part. In some versions, their differences get
violent, as each one is convinced he has it right and tries to dominate. In some versions of the story, they stop
talking, start listening, and work together to “see” the whole elephant.
Isn’t it time we all become more conscious and more
intentional about this? Isn’t it time
we all stop trying to defend our one right truth and find ways to be in
conversation with those who may have experienced a different truth? And even more importantly, isn’t it time for
us to remember the call of all our religious traditions, the call to love and
compassion? We live in such a broken and
hurting world. Isn’t it time to work
together to make the world more peaceful and just?
Fran Hayes
October 2, 2015
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