In many parts of the world, religion
is an important part of the identify of a human being. There are clashes and
riots based on religious choices, places of worship and rituals. In this era of
violence using religion as an excuse, this is a simple checklist for self-Diagnosis
on whether one is a religious sectarian or worse, a full-blown bigot. Read these statements and introspect. All
statements start with ‘I’ because as I mentioned before, it is meant for
self-diagnosis. The answers should be YES or NO.
- I believe followers of my religion will find heaven/attain salvation/attain spiritual superiority whereas followers of other religions will all either go to hell/not find salvation/continue to be steeped in ignorance.
- I believe that the rituals or rites in my religion have a deep philosophical and religious/scientific meaning whereas most of the rites found in other religions are superstitions/blind beliefs.
- Whenever there is a sex scandal involving a religious priest/maulvi/imam/guru/swami of my religion, I am convinced that it is the work of his enemies or the enemies of my religion, whereas if the news is about religious priest/guru/maulvi/swami of another religion, I happily believe the news to be 100 % true.
- When someone who follows my religion uses violence against others, I think he/she is ‘defending’ my religion from others, but if people of other religion adopt similar violence, I call them terrorists/fundamentalists/ militants/radicals.
- I think my religion has deeper philosophy/more holiness/more purity than other religions.
- I read the books of other religions so that I can find verses which look silly/illogical and thus reinforce my opinion that my religious book is the best and has all the solutions. I never read the religious books of other religions in full, understanding the context and full meaning of what is said.
- When I meet a new person I wait to hear which religion he follows and based on his/her choice immediately form an opinion about that person based on what I think about that religion.
- I always fear that members of my religion are being persecuted. I sometimes believe that the world is conspiring against my religion and that the population of those who follow my religion is decreasing. I always remember areas of the world where the population of my religion followers is going down, but rarely remember those areas where their population is going up.
- When I hear a person has embraced the same religion as I follow, I feel elated, but if a person leaves my religion and joins another religion I consider him lost his way/shameless/greedy or converted due to force.
- I definitely get/would get very angry when/if a member of my family marries someone outside my religion, especially if it is my daughter or another female relative such as niece.
If I have answered YES to all the
above questions, undoubtedly, I must be a religious fanatic. If none of this is
true, I think one is on the way to break free from the chains of religious
bigotry. Once again, please note this is
for self-diagnosis and should not be used to judge whether others are sectarian
or no. Readers of this short blog are free to add their own checklist points.
©Staju Jacob, 2017.
Staju Jacob is the author of the path-breaking book Karmasutra The Karma of Sex, which deals with the karmic spirituality of consensual sexual actions. This book is available globally on various Amazon sites in Paperback and Kindle, Sony Kobo, Google books, Iphone Ibook etc. He may be contacted on Twitter @KaRmasutraTKOS
