RELIGION FANATIC

Religious fanaticism comes not from deep faith,
but from a lack of it.
What is a religious fanatic, at heart?
The fanatic is someone who is convinced that
just believing in God and living a moral life is
simply not enough.
The fanatic feels compelled to engage in
behaviors that demonstrate his faith. He believes
that the magnitude of those behaviors must be
commensurate with the strength of his faith. The
more he believes, the more he has to do to show
it.
It’s all a matter of degree, because every religious
person feels he has to do something , and it’s
only a question of how much.
It might be going to church on Sunday, or
keeping a kosher home, or praying five times a
day. We call these people the faithful.
It might be devoting one’s life to serving the
poor, or donating large sums of money to the
church, or becoming a priest. We call these
people fully committed.
It might be crashing jet planes into tall buildings.
We call these people fanatics.
The only thing religious fanaticism really
demonstrates is weakness on the part of the
fanatic. Weakness in his own faith.
The fanatic believes that his simple faith is not
enough. He must do more. And if there is nothing
reasonably more to do, he’ll invent something.
It might be putting on a hair shirt, or excessive
fasting, or mounting an army to invade the lands
of the infidels or heathens and convert them all
to his religion.
Whatever it is, it’s generally about insufficient
faith that believing and living a good life is
enough.
It’s also about inventing what you think God
wants you to do because you don’t really know.
Nobody really does.
But as long as you keep pretty much to yourself,
nobody should much care how you choose to
manifest your faith. It’s when you look down your
nose at someone who doesn’t attend church
regularly that you start to cross over into the
world of the fanatic.
By the way, can we accept it as axiomatic that
imposing religious practices on someone else is
inherently absurd? What good could such a thing
possibly do?
It won’t save the soul of the non-believer who is
merely going through the motions.
It can’t possibly be looked upon with favor by the
God of your choice.
I personally don’t think that God wants us to do
many of the things that a lot of people feel
compelled to do as part of their faith.
Then again, my opinion on the matter is as
utterly useless as anyone else’s. And don’t think
I’m unaware of the hypocrisy in all of the
foregoing: Here I am looking down my nose at
everyone whose religious opinions don’t match
my own!
Then again, I don’t bother anybody with mine. In
this regard I can rightfully claim I’m no Taliban.
We all need to pick and choose what we choose
to believe, and leave everybody else out of it
because none of us really knows. For my money, I
like what Micah told Judah were the only things
necessary to avoid the coming catastrophe: “Do
justice, love mercy, and walk humbly with your
God.”
I can’t believe God cares if you go to church. In
fact, I think God would be mightily in your face if
you went to church five times a day and lived a
rotten life. You’re better off not going to church
at all if all it does is underscore your hypocrisy.
You think Allah is going to look favorably on
people who obey the Seven Pillars of Islam and
then crash planes into tall buildings? Probably
not any more than he is on people who go to
church on Sundays and overcharge their
customers on Mondays.
There is another important thing that
characterizes the religious fanatic, and that is the
inevitable corruption of the original underlying
belief system. Because that system probably
never demanded that kind of devotion in the first
place, one has to retroactively justify it somehow.
That’s done by making stuff up that wasn’t part
of the religion in the first place.
We see this all the time. In Judaism, for example,
the simple phrase “Thou shalt not boil a calf in
its mother’s milk” got blown up over time into
the most incredibly complex and stringent set of
religious dietary laws on the planet. In
Christianity, we saw the unimaginably horrific
atrocities of the Inquisition, which tortured and
burned people all across Europe for the good of
their souls.
The Taliban example needs no further
expounding.
My favorite passage in the western Bible comes
from Amos, a Judean shepherd living a few miles
outside of Bethlehem who had no connection at
all with the “professional prophets” but who felt
compelled to speak out against the professed
pieties of sinning Israelites. Here he is, quoting
God ( New Jerusalem Bible version):
“I hate, I scorn your festivals,
I take no pleasure in your solemn
assemblies.
When you bring me burnt
offerings…
your oblations, I do not accept
them
and I do not look at your
communion sacrifices of fat cattle.
Spare me the din of your chanting,
let me hear none of your strumming
on lyres,
but let justice flow like water,
and uprightness like a never-failing
stream.”
Needless to say, this little performance got Amos
thrown out of Israel.
Damned fanatic.
from: A Practical Guide for Everyday Living , BY Lee Gruenfeld