This page is about some of my thoughts and ideas. It is greatly influenced by my experiences, the conversations I have with people and a few insightful books. By its very nature, this blog is an expression of opinion, so it is likely to be biased by my world view. Hit me up if you wish to share your thoughts regarding these blog posts.
We live in a time where we hear about communal and religious violence every day. At the same time the number of people who call themselves atheists and campaign against religion is on the rise. In such a time, I will be making a stand, in defence of religion, not in defence of communal violence, mind you, in favor of the idea of a religion.
It is easy to be mistaken by the increased news of religious conflict that we are moving into a world of global chaos. But this is as a result of improved global communication, not because there are more extremists in the world. If anything, the amount of extremism has shown an overall decline since medieval times. So, we are indeed moving towards more peaceful religions on a broad time scale, although there may be temporary periods of radical behavior.
I do not need to justify the importance of religion in promoting human values. All of the world’s major religions advocate treating others with love and compassion. They are also a source of hope, since they create an illusion of a better future. The concept of “karma” is an essential fiction to prevent the human society from falling into anarchy. All religions also teach us the route to long lived happiness; overcoming ones desires, something that has been justified by modern psychology.
And these positives of religion are accepted by everybody, even atheists. What the atheists argue against is the religious practices and rituals, all the random bullshit that accompanies these values. Do we really need these parts of religion? The answer is yes, we do! Why? Because a majority of humans are either lack the time or the intellectual capability to comprehend these values in the abstract. They need rituals, they need legends and myths, they need statues and religious sites, to be able to justify these values. To be able to understand these high virtues and principles on their own, without someone brainwashing them with religious rituals to imbibe them, is simply too resource consuming. They also need the social aspects of religion, a million other people around them following the same belief system, to be able to reinforce it when their faith in these values is shaken by some negative experience.
Throughout history, religion has played a bigger role in uniting people than in dividing them. Humans love stories, fiction captures their imagination. The idea of a shared fiction, a religion (or for that matter money, nationalism, communism, capitalism, basically any ism are shared fictions), unites people and makes it easier for them to trust or distrust someone who they have never met. This helps them to form larger societies, and make industrial progress through long distance trade, something that is impossible without trust.
Sadly for all these feathers that religion has in its hat, it comes with humanity’s greatest flaw. The tendency to dominate, to impose oneself on others, with the belief that it is for the better. This missionary behavior has been seen in all of the world’s large religions, and is the fuel for conflict. If only people of different faiths would be able to understand that their religions are only a thin veil over the same underlying values, this would lead to huge progress.
It is wrong to claim that religion has only done wrong the world. Its historical achievements and its role in cementing the human society largely outweigh its divisive effect. And if we were to blame religion for the conflict it causes, we should look at our own nations, they were not formed without eons of imperial ambitions and genocidal wars on nationalist ambitions. Rather we should accept religion for its past, the role it has played in shaping today’s world. The shared fictions it creates, and the hope it provides to prevent the world from falling into anarchy, is essential for social stability. At the same time, we must make sure that people understand the underlying virtues of their religion, the values it teaches, so that whenever their fictions and rituals clash with someone else’s they are able to reason about these virtues and not fight over their narratives.