Humanity constantly searches for meaning. It is written in our DNA that we are not satisfied unless we are digging in to find the answers to the largest questions in life. Religion is one way to do this and, while our religious beliefs evolve over time, it is always a powerful force in our world. Even the truly non-religious search for meaning, and form their own belief systems based on the material knowledge of the world. History tells us that our beliefs can be a guiding light to lead us toward a better future, but it has also led us to some of our darkest times. During these dark times, it can become difficult to see the light that comes to us from our spirituality, but it is always there. I believe that we are going through one of those dark times now – and because of this, it is imperative that we find our light.
I used to think that the world was becoming more and more secular, and religion was not as powerful a force in our modern day as it has been in the past. Certainly, there are growing numbers of the population that claim not to be religious, regularly engage in religious practice, or belong to any organized religion. Yet as the second decade of the 21st century comes to a close, it seems that religion still dominates our society in many ways – some of which are quite disturbing. In fact, in recent years, certain religious ideologies seem to be growing in global influence even while, by the numbers, their influence should be declining.
Many of the louder religious voices today, particularly in Islam and Christianity, lead us down a dark path of nationalism, racism, terrorism, hatred and fear. This can be confounding to those who follow the same path and feel that it teaches the exact opposite. It is strange to think that slave owners during the Civil War would read from their holy book and find justification for slavery and the necessity of going to war to defend that justification, while people like Martin Luther King Jr. – using inspiration from that very same book – could make the case for Civil Rights and the end of segregation. Certainly, many Christians today cringe when they hear fundamentalist preachers quoting biblical scripture and speaking words of hatred against others for their religion, race, nationality, sexual orientation or gender identity – especially if they find acceptance, compassion and forgiveness when they read that book. Likewise, many Muslims are horrified at the thought that their holy book is being used to justify poor treatment of women and violent acts of terrorism against people who believe differently than they do. How is it that one book can inspire hate in one person and love in another?
Likely there are many reasons, depending upon the individual who is interpreting the book (or more likely letting someone interpret it for them). For me, one main reason stands out. It’s not really about the holy book at all or about what’s in it. It’s about two very different and conflicting world views. These world views are nothing new. In fact, these world views have been debated for as long as we have written record. They can be defined as two very different answers to the following question:
Left alone and without intervention, what will humanity do?
There are two answers to this question. The first answer is: Humanity, left alone and without intervention, will typically get worse over time, succumb to its lower nature, become like animals, and destroy itself. The second answer is: Humanity, left alone and without intervention, will typically get better over time, ascend to its higher nature, and evolve to become more. In other words, one view is that humanity is essentially evil, while the other view is that humanity is essentially good. The key to understanding how the religious experience can be so different between one person and another is understanding that religious teaching is different depending upon which of these two views a person holds. Someone who believes that humanity is essentially evil needs something much different in their religious experience than someone who thinks that humanity is essentially good.
The First View
A person who believes that humanity is essentially evil needs to find something external to themselves to keep them from doing evil things. They need laws and rules. They need their morality spelled out for them. They need guidance in the form of absolutes. For these individuals there can be no gray area. They live in a binary, either-or world. It must all be in black and white, right and wrong, good and bad. To take from Christain symbology; since they feel that they are born sinners destined for hell without some kind of divine intervention, they cannot deal with any kind of moral or spiritual ambiguity. In their world view, if they could not consult their book, pray for guidance, or in some other way involve the intervention of divinity, they would make the wrong decision – since they are evil and tend toward evil, any autonomous decision they made would by definition be evil. In addition to divine intervention, the other tool needed to keep someone who feels they are evil by nature on the straight and narrow path toward righteousness, is punishment and reward. If you let your divinity help you make your decisions then you will go to heaven. If you don’t, then you will suffer eternally in hell. For someone who has this world view, fear is the greatest motivator.
Unfortunately, this world view often allows its followers to be easily influenced by savvy politicians or religious leaders who would use religion for their own purposes. If you believe in absolutes, and believe that your religion gives you a path toward becoming a good person (or at least escaping hell), then it is also easy to believe that others who don’t follow your particular path are evil people. With this concept in place, it is easy to be manipulated into dehumanizing people who believe differently, label them as “other” and view them as a threat. They become less than you because you have chosen to be righteous and they have not. They become something to fear because their beliefs could tempt you into leaving your own path and condemn you to eternal suffering. This is how religion has been used as a tool to set people against one another. It is the reason the terrorist can feel morally justified in murdering innocent people. It has historically been the justification for genocide, for most wars, and for atrocities such as burning other human beings at the stake.
Often an authority figure will refer to the followers of a particular religion as “the faithful” while others are called “heretic” or “infidel” in order to justify violence against other groups of people. This “us-vs-them” mentality is, sadly, seen today in the rhetoric of the President Elect of the United States, when he refers to other human beings as “infestation” and “invasion” when referring to immigrants who have a different color skin than he does. They are the evil that must be removed in order for the faithful (or the country, in the example above) to stay on its righteous path. Now, the President of the United States is not a religious leader, but this particular President has the support of many Fundamentalist Christians, who view him as the executor and manifestation of their belief system. He is therefore a somewhat secular spokesperson for a religious movement, which is not all that uncommon in history.
Quite often, the laws of a particular religion are applied unevenly. They are focused more on those outside the religion, than those within it. Transgressions by the faithful are overlooked, while the transgressions of those who do not follow the faith are held up as evidence of their degraded or immoral nature and used to demonstrate their difference and separateness. A savvy authority figure will also tend to ignore certain religious laws that are inconvenient to the overall narrative they are trying to create and focus on other laws that can show how the unfaithful are ruining moral society.
The Second View
So, what about the others who have the second worldview, the people who believe that humanity is essentially good? They have much different requirements from religious teaching. Certainly, just because they feel that they are essentially good that doesn’t mean that they can’t do evil things or make bad decisions, so they also need laws. Yet it is interesting to note that they often look to different laws in their book, and tend to apply those laws to themselves more often than they apply them to others. Certainly, all religious texts have rules that say things like: Don’t kill, don’t steal, etc. However, people with the second worldview often read more into their scripture and look for the things they should do rather than the things they shouldn’t. If you ask a Christian with this world view what the most important piece of guidance they were taught by their religion, it would be more likely that their first response would be something about the Golden Rule, rather than the Ten Commandments.
As a consequence, people who subscribe to this world view are markedly less concerned about what happens when they die, or about any other kind of punishment or reward for their behavior. They know they are good, and give themselves permission to do good, and thus are more often occupied with doing the right thing at the present moment than they are about what could happen in the afterlife.
Such individuals also read their holy book from a different perspective. Rather than looking for guidance, they are looking for meaning. Religious teaching is laced with allegory and symbolism. Such teaching is not designed merely for an external absolute truth. It is designed to talk to each individual in a deeply personal way; to excite the unconscious mind and help each person discover who they are. As such, the truths are both subjective and profound.
Those who believe that mankind is destined to improve over time tend to challenge themselves in their religion and take the religious text less literally. They see their scripture as a mystery to be solved, and the process of solving that mystery is a process of self-discovery. For them religious teaching is not something that can be given by someone else, nor can another person’s understanding of religion every completely match your own. Religion teaching, then, is an experience – a relationship between each individual person and their spiritual practice.
Religious writing, with its symbols and its parables, seems to be designed just for this purpose. For those who wish to look beyond the moral codes and simple laws, and wishes for something more than just the gratification of knowing what will happen after death, scripture takes on a much deeper and much more important meaning. It becomes less about what happens after we die, and more about what we do while we are here. It’s no longer about acting in a moral way because we fear eternal damnation, but about truly seeking within to understand what is right and what is wrong in any specific circumstance, and longing to do that right thing for no other reason than because it is right.
In the world today, it can easily appear that religious people who adopt the first philosophy – that mankind is inherently evil – are rapidly growing. Certainly, they are becoming louder and more influential at this point in history. However, despite this hateful rhetoric, I remain a follower of the second philosophy. I believe that humanity gets better over time.
I also believe that, while religious fundamentalism is loud and growing in size, there are exponentially more of us who study our particular religious faith in silence. We seek a relationship with our faith, and we know that this relationship is a personal one. Therefore, we do not judge those who believe differently, and certainly do not judge an entire faith based on the behavior and the rhetoric of a certain sect of followers. I believe that the majority of the faithful endeavor to be charitable and compassionate, and to do the right thing as much as they possibly can. In the end, that’s all we can do – and it’s the only thing that matters.
Tony Hornsby 
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