Governor's Scholars Program: The center for Kentucky intelligentsia!
I was titillated at the concept. A diverse range of Kentucky bright people would show up, and we would all learn from each other, especially from each other's religions and concepts of faith. Muslims, Buddhists, Jews, and Hindus paired with Catholics, Baptists, and Methodists. What fun! What a chance for the communal sharing of holy knowledge!
I have never seen more people in one place wearing Christian devotional T-shirts, and I participated in an Episcopal Acolyte Festival once.
I have never had to defend my relatively open-minded views more fiercely than before. GSP was a spiritual experience, in that I had to come up with my very own devotional statement in order to keep my faith:
GOD DOES NOT SEND GOOD PEOPLE TO HELL.
The only problem with this statement is that many people disagree on what a good person is. One of my friends was a staunch Fundamentalist and sadly closed-minded. He argued that Islam is tantamount to Satanism; his arguments were 1) the Crusades, 2) the Hagia Sophia ("the greatest Christian church ever, and they turned it into a [unclean, unholy] mosque!'), and 3) Islamic Fundamentalists (hmmm...) in the world today. Point by point, and blow by blow, I defended my stance.
POINT ONE: The Crusades showed how bad those infidel
Muslims are because they defiled the Holy Lands.
COUNTERPOINT: We seem to forget that the Holy Lands are holy
to the Muslims too. The Crusades were actually started by the European orders of
knighthood; the Muslims, even in the Hagia Sophia, were relatively tolerant to Christians
in the area. The Crusades were also not the holy wars they were made out to be; the
Muslims had just as much right to Palestine, if not more, than the invading Europeans; the
Europeans attacked not only for God but for control of the lucrative spice trade routes
through the Middle East to India; and a great many atrocities were committed by both
sides in what was considered to be a divinely-inspired war. Besides that, a peaceful
religion cannot be debunked by the infidelities of past demagogues. If that were the
case, probably only Buddhism would remain as a valid religion (unless Ghengis Khan was a
Buddhist...).
POINT TWO: The Hagia Sophia was the greatest church ever,
and it got turned into a mosque.
COUNTERPOINT: So? Many beautiful mosques in Moor
Iberia (Spain) were converted into churches. How can a religion be evil because it
changes the focus of a single temple? Hell, the Muslims, after capturing the HS,
even shared it with the local Christians for the longest time until the European
Crusaders came in and spoiled the party.
POINT THREE: Islamic Fundamentalists prove that Islam is
bad by blowing themselves (and others) up.
COUNTERPOINT: By that argument, wrongdoing Fundamentalists of any
religion make their attendant religions evil. Just because a few demagogues pervert
religion to their own temporal political ends, or because some maniacs go off and kill
people, does not invalidate a religion. Bad Muslims kill in the name of Allah; bad
Christians kill in the name of God. Osama says he is the hammer of Allah; Crusader
Popes said they were the hammers or fists or whatever of God. Same damned thing.
This takes a lot of strength to say in today's post-Twin Towers world... the
demagogues will pay...
Anyway, back to the devotional statement:
GOD DOES NOT SEND GOOD PEOPLE TO HELL.
Here's how I see things (All stations! Brace for hate mail!):
1) If a man gets a job simply because he knows the boss's son,
with no consideration of skills whatsoever, it is a form of nepotism, which is unjust.
2) If a man gets into Heaven because he knows God's Son, with no
other considerations of morality nor virtue, that is equally a form of nepotism, which is
unjust.
3) "Knowing," or accepting, Jesus as savior
"absolves the knower of all sin," thereby eliminating "other
considerations."
4) Anyone who doesn't accept Jesus gets thrown into hellfire and
brimstone and all that.
5) A just God can never be unjust (duh!).
6) Therefore, God either unjustly sends good people (who don't
believe in Jesus) to Hell, or Christ is not the only bridge to Heaven.
7) I would rather burn in Hell for eternity rather than believe
in an unjust God.
8) I therefore believe that God has a higher standard (or at
least more expansive) of "good" than we give It credit for.
I feel that Christ, as well as other holy people like Mohammed and the Buddha, were all sent by God to help guide the Universe along (see my Tim on the Moral Construction of the Universe essay) as well as to give humans moral exemplars to try and live up to. Practically no one can be as loving as Christ, nor as pragmatically good as Mohammed, nor as fundamentally wise as the Buddha. We can try, though, and our effort and success in trying determines our chances for the afterlife. What is truly important is how much we align ourselves to the ideal, and, logically, if we are aligned with the ideal then good deeds will follow. It is ludicrous to imagine a "good" person doing "bad" things. We aren't graded on good works, but good works are an indicator of success in varying degrees.
And so, I'll stop with my second devotional statement.
I WOULD RATHER BURN IN HELL THAN BELIEVE IN AN UNJUST GOD.