The Philosophy of Comics
I came across this cartoon on a website for religious tolerance. One of the webmasters "mused" and wrote a short piece following the cartoon:"Imagine the results if more people in the world realized the simple fact that there are over 11,000 religions in the world and that it is impossible with our present knowledge to find out which is the "true" one. An inevitable corollary to this belief would be that they would develop a degree of doubt that their religion is the only "true" one. People might be less inclined to oppress, discriminate against, murder or commit mass murder and genocide against people of other faiths such as has happened during the past decade in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Cyprus, Nigeria, Sudan, Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, Afghanistan, India, Sri Lanka, Philippines, Indonesia, the U.S. etc.
Imagine the results if more people accepted their religion as the best faith for them, but at the same time recognized that there are other religions which teach about other deities, other systems of morality, other religious practices, etc. Yet almost all of them motivate people to lead better lives. There might be fewer people willing to defend their particular religion by oppressing or killing followers of other religions and spiritual paths." *
An interesting proposition, indeed.
However, I believe that this question, when asked seriously to oneself, can be a method of destruction in and of itself. Perhaps wars may not be fought on the outside with others, but an inner battle resulting in a genocide of the soul may take place. But as to quote an earlier post of mine, will it "issue [solely] destruction or initiate new growth and life?"
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Leave a comment...
*http://www.religioustolerance.org/reltrue.htm
posted by bellevoce | 4:45 PM
4 Comments:
Besides, to blame religion for all these woes is to delude oneself. Religion was just the justification for the crimes (at least in the majority of cases). I mean, the worst case of slaughter/genocide (the German Holocaust) was due to science...
Insightful, to say the least.
I was unaware there were that many religions. That is insane.
I heard a quote from Francis Schaeffer recently, which said that there was basically, essentially, only one reason to believe in Christianity: because it's true.
I take hearty issue with the statement that "it is impossible with our present knowledge to find out which is the 'true' one." Obviously the writer has never read Romans 1....
AJ
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Steven, I agree, I meant to include it in the post, but decided to post it after. I thought of communist China and/or Russia who commit/ted murders and genocides in the name of politics and the denial of religion. It is still an issue of tolerance, but not of one religion against another, but by those intolerant of religions period.
AJ,
I thoroughly agree with your quote from Francis Schaeffer. You should only put your life towards and belief in something if it is true. Thus the importance of the question in the comic.
Thanks folks!
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