Once upon a time a friend asked me: “What is your religion?”
To that question I gave the following response:
“I am a liberal and thus believe that we all have the rights to choose our faith, and with the same token I am inclined to respect other people’s choice of belief system. However, I would use the same autonomy not to select a faith, but to create one. In this way I have set to establish a faith with my own limited knowledge, by myself, and for myself while respecting those who have decided to adopt their beliefs from the convenient sources such as organized religion.
Hence, I am neither a believer nor a non-believer, neither Jewish nor Christian, neither Agnostic nor Atheist, since for me to be any of those demands conformation without ample information; to be categorized as such requires faith or lack thereof without sufficient reason since the futile attempt at proving the supremacy of your beliefs upon others requires the inherently flawed illusion of righteousness as well as a better-than-thou-attitude which only results in repudiation and intolerance.
Religion is a choice that people make in order to appear just, I on the other hand do not choose to be right, but rather I choose to be happy.”
5 comments:
Your point of view on faith and religions is interesting to me Daniel however, I should say that I disagree with you in some parts. You see, I disagree with the part which you mentioned that people who believe in a certain religion, do so because of lack of knowledge or ignorance in some way. Or stating that such individuals are intolerant to other beliefs and religions is incorrect. You are right, many people from a specific religion do not agree with people from other religions and often times quarrel but that has nothing to do with the religion itself. I always say that, if some people are ignorant and stupid, that doesn't mean the whole human race aslo is. You can imply this to religon, race and such as well. I'm a muslim and I didn't become one just because I was born and named a muslim but because I studied this religion, I studied it's aspects, laws and everything and then I chose. Now many get freaked out when they hear that I'm a muslim because unlike many other so called muslims I'm no ignorant, I respect other's beliefs and cultures and I never look down on someone who states he's agnostic, or athiest or christian or jew or from any other religion. I have become me because I fowllowed my religion and it grieves my heart when I see that many terrorists who call themselves muslims, kill and hurt people and it grieves me more when I feel utter hate coming towards me from others just because I'm a muslim because they don't see me as who I am, they only see me as one of the terrorists. What I'm trying to say is that, when you take pride in what you believe in and start looking down on others, you'll never see them as who they really are and will never want to hear what they have to say to you, you'll only see them as people who chose to believe in something that was built long time ago and therefore aren't smart enough or have made a mistake. It's great to believe that people have the right and freedom to believe what they want to believe as long as you don't judge them for that. Sorry about the really long comment but I really thought I should share all this with you.
Dear Aigle,
As I mentioned in the text, as a liberal, I see it as my very responsibility to respect not only Muslims, but even Hindus, Buddhist, and even people who are secular.
My point is that I personally would like to choose my own faith and I would not try to show that I am right or wrong. Most of the religious fights are when we are trying to prove that we are right.
By removing the desire to be right, and deciding to enjoy our own faith and respect others we then can insure a life of success and prosperity withing the confines of whatever faith we aspire to.
As always, thanks for leaving your comment and expressing your opinion.
Please for humanity's sake please do it once
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I believe it because I don’t understand it."TERTOLIANUS"
Liberalism has become an escaping point from thinking in todays world and itself has got stuck in the framework of its advices.
I look at liberalism as an escaping point for not selecting and I believe in kierkeggard's statement as he says sometimes not selecting is a selection itself .
I abide by ethics in support of philosophers and I don’t value religion as religion but the problem starts where supporters of liberalism are seeking freedom of thinking and speech and they recommend the free exchange of ideas but if being in the chain of liberalism is not being limited to any particular sect.
Do you believe in all liberalisms thoughts and advices and do you think with this belief you are free from any religion?have you seen real liberalism anywhere in the world?do you believe in religions liberalism as a branch of liberalism and do you mix religion with politics?
Deficiencies of liberalism can be clearly seen in its belief in amperism &makiavism and the attention of this approach to the person (individual)and lack of enough efficiency in the answer to the question who is the individual and does individual mean the isolated individual without considering his upbringing in the society?and the silence of this approach to a worldwide meaning is probably one of the most important challenges of this approach.
And but you dear friend.aigle. I read your article wholeheartedly and I have a question from you and that is "is it important that how others react to your religion?" It’s a while that
The voice of muslimes has mixed with complaint but if we believe that terrorism is the result of awkward action of some people and this has nothing to do with religion in that case we may protect our belief bether and easier!
Dear Matin, Liberalism is not freedom from religion, but rather it is freedom for religion. I recommend you the book "The Future of Liberalism" by Alan Wolf.
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