Knowledge Is Bliss
Intense religious discussion last night at my sister-in-law's birthday party. To paraphrase Andy Rooney: ever notice how "intense" and "religious discussion" often go together? Might as well be redundant.
I was listening as interlocuter number 1 defended Muslims, saying that some of his best friends were Muslims and that a religion can't be held responsible for the negative actions of their followers. Interlocuter number 2 disagreed, saying that Islam was the root cause of their terrorist pathologies. (And interlocuter number 2, being the member of a new, young dynamic church with no history or baggage, made the claim with equanimity.)
I had no choice who to side with if only because the priestly scandal was still fresh on everyone's minds (and was in fact alluded to in the discussion). I sided with interlocuter number 1, saying that the fact that Judas betrayed Christ was evidence that you can be a member of the greatest religion and still badly misrepresent the faith.
But this isn't an either/or. It's like nature/nuture debate. Part of it is that bad faiths ruin people and part is bad people ruin faiths. Of course I didn't say that; I think through my fingertips and I didn't have a keypad handy (and even with the keypad bat my weight).
The other obligatory target was the Catholic church, said to be still preaching the Old Testament. An ex-Catholic said that his Catholic education consisted of "the Old Testament and Mary." I said I didn't learn too much OT in my classes but I did agree that Catholic education was poor during the '70s. I admitted that I've learned an awful lot post-college that I should've learned at my Catholic high school. Someone else said that the Catholic Church didn't teach the bible - they didn't have a bible study class until they were out of college. I said that that is why Scott Hahn is popular now; he's filling a need.
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