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Andrew Rutajit - On Religion
“Truth, in matters of religion, is simply the opinion that has survived”
~ Oscar Wilde

I’ve heard there are two ways of truly finding oneself – Religion and Revelation. However, religion will never be complete within you until you complete it within yourself…that’s a revelation; religion alone lends itself to too much faith.

Religion is a belief system embedded throughout with morals and creeds to live by; but for the most part, it is simply a system of beliefs and opinions. However, what religion is and what it does are completely different. Religion encourages the singularity of thought on matters to which people hold very strong convictions. Today, books with diverse opinions on any topic you can imagine can be found at most bookstores or libraries…if not there, the Internet is a wealth of information. If it were my will, I could not only learn all about a culture and community living on the other side of the planet; I could learn to speak their language, I could buy food and textiles directly from them, and I could worship their God and read all of their sacred texts…I could do all of this without ever leaving my home. With all of these things so easily accessible, religion is going to need to loosen it’s belt or it may not survive the information age.

Information (A.K.A. “truth”) and religion do not make good bedfellows. For example, religion is in a continuing battle against science. TIME Magazine recently ran an article about America’s youth “Slacking Off in Science Class.” It was on the front cover in February 2006; the focal point was regarding education - “Is America flunking science?” A Canadian reader replied with a letter to the editor saying – “If Americans are truly concerned about falling behind, why do they waste precious time teaching religion in science class?” Apparently, the most recent data regarding bacteria flagellum orchestrates the ebb and flow of the contemporary thinker’s perception of “Intelligent Design”…which is just another way of saying “God” without actually saying the word.

Religion can no longer simplify things to a point where the individual does not question key issues. Debates over these issues lead to separation from the “hub” and as a result, branches of the religion begin to form. Some spend their entire lives trying to convert others; not to convert others to their particular religion, but to a particular sect of a religion. Each sect believes they have the true answers, each denomination thinks this on a larger scale, and this expands to each and every world religion. I think, what it boils down to, is ego. Our ego tries to convince us that our deepest, most concrete beliefs are not only infallible, but unquestionable. To question your faith is to lack faith.

When I meditate on this thought, I can’t help but think of the “spokes of a wheel” metaphor Rodger Stevens uses… the heart of the matter is the fact that there is and only can be, one true religion. There always has been just one. It’s the many branches or spokes radiating out from the one that has given the illusion of many. The layers and layers of symbolism and anthropomorphism added to religion over the ages have left us with stories and teachings that can be shared with everyone and understood on many different levels. After all, the very concept of “God” is confounding, words often fail to convey ones thoughts on the matter; symbolism and anthropomorphism are often necessary to get the point across.

Giving “God” a name is just a way to anthropomorphize omnipresence. There is no opposite of this omnipresence, but somehow this omnipresence has appeared to have divided itself into good and evil - yin/yang. A medieval Bulgarian sect (founded by Bogomil in the 10th century) has constantly declared God has two sons, the rebellious Satan and the obedient Jesus. I like this allegory because it shows that God cannot be split and consequently is personified as having divine offspring who are in perfect balance with one another. The male dominated church creating these personifications and stories were to too patriarchal to include the balance of the female deity; as a result, Lucifer, Jesus, and God are all male characters. However, anyone can do an Internet search for the connections between Lucifer, the light bringer, and the planet Venus. When the Bible was translated into Latin, the Greek name for the planet Venus (the light-bringer) was translated as Lucifer (directly from lux [light] and ferre [to carry, bring or bear]). My point being, Venus/Lucifer in Greek mythology is Venus/Aphrodite…a female, so here is the female/male balance of the offspring of God in this myth.

No matter which myths a religion is founded upon, religions are (for the most part) morally good. The essential virtues of a Christian differ very little (if at all) from the virtues of an atheist, Jew, Muslim, Hindu, etc.

These virtues are the roots and body of religion itself; beyond this are the branches that I mentioned. The branches are created by ego…man trying to build upon life’s most basic morals has, in the end, built entire empires and has given these empires complete authority over everything. What’s worse is the fact that these empires are seen as infallible…to question the powers that be is to lack faith in God. Here’s a shocker – the “powers that be” don’t know anymore than we do; and they made a lot of it up as they went along.

Consider the Catholic Saint Augustine; he spent a large portion of his early adulthood opposed to religion. He liked to drink and party and he liked to have lots of sex with lots of women. But, when he was sitting with his mother at her death-bed, holding her hand as she passed away, he made a promise to her that he would convert to Christianity. He kept his promise; Augustine joined the Church and later became a Saint. What he did after joining the Church has often been compared to a cigarette smoker quitting smoking cold turkey and finding himself in a workplace full of smokers…Augustine, after quitting sex and partying cold turkey, developed a vengeance against the lust-filled life he once lived. He’s quoted as saying, “Lust requires for its consummation darkness and secrecy; and this not only when unlawful intercourse is desired, but even such fornication as the earthly city has legalized.” He demonized the things that he could no longer partake in and his assault on sexuality is still felt today. Apparently, Augustine didn’t blame himself for these “sins”; according to him, all sins are instilled at birth and passed down onto us via Adam and Eve. Consequently, children must be baptized at birth because we are all born into sin. What a weird concept; everyone on earth is sinful, bad and corrupt, unless they become Christian. How convenient, if we’re all born into sin, then the Church must be our only salvation from Hell.

Back then, in Augustine’s time, in a time and place of famine, war and plagues; people had no problem envisioning a place equal or worse after their death. Being surrounded with death, special attention to the afterlife is only natural and when there is only one church in town, that church has a monopoly on spirituality AND psychotherapy. When a church makes a promise of absolute bliss in the afterlife, and your life is a living hell to begin with…well, let’s just say that the pews were full. This is when the Church built upon Augustine’s ideas and started to really drive home the notion of sin and it’s consequence, hell. They would preach sermon after sermon, describing what hell would be like, how painful it would be, the notion that one would spend eternity in this horrid place, the constant smell of sulfur, the feeling of being torn to pieces over and over and over. Before long, the congregation began to listen to the sermons for the same reason we today go to a horror movie; many went to church just to be entertained by the elaborate and gory descriptions of hell.

Religions must stop competing for God’s grace and stop painting humankind into a good vs. evil motif. A web of insanity has been woven over our reality whereby the word “God” is so loaded with meaning, to some people “Shiva” is seen as a heathen deity. It’s a foggy reality where the “Old Testament” is good and the “Torah” is evil; where it’s perfectly fine to worship Jehovah, but not Allah (or visa versa). But the insanity doesn't stop there, if you worship Shiva, you need to be “saved” by someone who believes in Jesus; if you are a Catholic, you need to loosen up and become a Lutheran; Christians in general need to be converted (house by house) to Mormonism, and if that doesn't work out for you, Scientology has a personality test for you…it truly is a competition for God’s grace and your soul. The branches of the religion-tree begin to crisscross and fight for sunlight. The wise ones are those who can walk up to this religion-tree and digest its fruit…because the fruit is the same, no matter what branch it comes from.

Below is a brief excerpt from an essay on religion, written by Rodger Stevens:

Religions are like the spokes of a wheel, and the purpose is to get to the center, where there is peace and stability. Any spoke you want to choose will lead in two directions: inward, toward the center, or outward toward the periphery. Religions vie amongst each other for paying customers, each claiming to be the "one true spoke." Spokes are easy to distinguish out near the rim, where they are separate and seemingly independent, which is why most religions are concerned primarily with making sure everyone knows how they differ from other religions, and pointing their judgmental fingers at all the infidels who believe otherwise. It's the good-guy bad-guy game performed religiously.

Out on the circumference, activity is furious, so it looks like something meaningful is happening there . . . all the fancy robes and golden candlesticks and crowds of faithful followers swooning in each others arms. Sometimes one particular spoke is up, in its heyday, and its spiritual pride will not go unadvertised. Sometimes it is down in which case the crowds flock elsewhere.

Each spoke points in two directions: toward the center, and also directly away from that same center. You can move in either direction, but the religious authorities would prefer, if not insist, that you go outward. The more outward you go, the more frantically you will have to cling to that spoke to keep from being thrown off. In time, you become a fervent believer . . . your social standing may demand it, not to mention the fate of your soul (whatever that might be), and if you behave you will remain in the good graces of the church. You need them (or at least you learn to believe so) and they definitely need you.

But as they merge toward the hub, the spokes begin to lose their individuality, they all begin to look similar, which is considered bad for business. The closer you get to the center, the more similarity emerges between the same spokes which appeared so different out on the circumference. You begin to see how they have certain things in common, and their similarities really outweigh their differences.