The universalism of human societies on our planet earth today is a striking modern phenomenon. We are all terribly tied together. We are all into each other’s business and lives. We have an information explosion, which ties us all together, world -wide, through the internet. Any of us can send messages to anyone else around the globe. It has become harder and harder to hide any event in any human society, which has significance to the rest of us. A disaster at one site in the world becomes known to the rest of the world in minutes. An uprising in one country is known to the rest of the world in minutes, and the details of that uprising are heard around the globe in the next few days. We can’t do anything without that effort affecting all others around us, and all other humans beyond. Most recently, we are acutely aware that financial mismanagement of one country affects all other countries. We are, all over the world, headed for a universal depression, because the United States has not managed its resources wisely, and several members of the European Union have also mismanaged their assets. There does not seem to be any way out of a world depression at this time. We have become one dominant species on the planet earth, all members of which are tied together as one giant organism.
This puts immense pressure on us to learn how to tolerate and how to deal with each other, and to learn those lessons in a hurry. So far, we are not doing a very good job at learning those lessons. We still see each other group that looks different, dresses differently, eats different foods, or has different beliefs, as being something or someone other than us. We are having terrible trouble seeing all humans, regardless of our expression, customs and beliefs, as us. The result, in our current world, is not very pretty. We are bombing each other, invading each other, torturing each other, rapidly destroying our resources, giving to the rich while taking away from the poor, and don’t seem to grasp the concept that unless we all accept each other, we will all fall in a heap without food and shelter, and in pain. If the current trends are not reversed, and we continue our current policies, we can see the apocalypse as not only threatening, but imminent. All those apocalyptic novels that are being written now have appeared for a reason. Some of our brightest minds are saying that we are only a few whiskers away from the atomic bombs, and the end of a world which promises plenty for all.
When we are so threatened, it seems from all corners, we are prone to turn to those teachings that promise to guide us to greater morality and better behavior. We are beginning to understand that it is time to make that gut-wrenching effort to compromise with all other humans. The best guides that we know, it seems, are our religions, which preach that we must have compassion and mercy. Judaism, Christianity and Islam all have stirring admonitions that we should take care of the stranger, the neighbor, the orphan, the widow, the lame, the poor, the dispossessed, if we wish to be a part of our God’s world. This marvelous advice is actively practiced by a large number of humans, who sacrifice their own well being to care for those other persons who are in need. It is now up to the rest of us to learn those same lessons, and learn them soon, before we are all in dire straits. We have the guide laws that we need. Our religions have not only provided them for us, but actively preach those principles. It is now up to the rest of us who do not practice those principles, to learn them with haste.
Unfortunately, that is not all there is to our religions. Our religions are highly bipolar. Each of them has, in addition to their loving admonitions, a very violent side, based on ancient mythology, that tells us we should kill our neighbors. In the case of Judaism, it is a gigantic myth that they are the superior people over all other people on the face of the earth. Their mythology tells them that their God has so decreed their superiority. This, to their mind, gives them the right to invade and kill with abandon, in order to protect their imagined superior status. In the case of Christianity, there are multiple directions from the mouth of their hero, Jesus, to send all those humans who do not believe in him, to torture for an eternity. This gives Christians the right, they believe, in defense of this morbid part of their mythology, to invade and kill, in defense of their Christian nation. In the case of Islam, Muhammad, their hero prophet, demands that his followers kill, torture or enslave all those humans who do not believe in him as the last and greatest prophet. The terribly sad thing about all this is that the rest of us allow those who are violent to others on the basis of these parts of their religion, to continue to believe they are doing what is right.
One of the problems is human greed. It has been very hard to overcome that obstacle and build stable, loving societies. Those who have an entrenched advantage do not want to give up any of their artificial privileges. The other and more immediate problem, one which we can cure rapidly with a little more emotional security, is the realization that we are using this inhumane part of our religions as an excuse to create mayhem. It is dire time for the human population to realize that these religious myths must be abandoned as guides to how we treat each other. They are the other poles of our religions, the predator poles that teach disrespect and violence. These myths can be cherished as history – but should never be used as our touchstones. These myths have no moral place in a human population which covers all the globe, and of which all of us are an integral part. The only parts of our religions which we should use as our guides to action are the compassion and mercy that each of them preaches.
This Christmas, we hope that Peace to All may have a new beginning. We pray that we may continue to embrace the compassion in our religions, continue to embrace the ancient mythology which they contain, but give up using these violent myths as horrible guidelines for our lives. This primitive religious mythology must be abandoned as an acceptable excuse many predators in our population use to commit human violence.