It was the day before Pope JPII finally succumbed
in April of 2005 that Pope Benedict was speaking to a crowd gathered in a
Gothic convent in the mountains outside Rome. It was a dialogue that echoed a
common argument of his: i.e., excluding 'God' from the public conscience would
have serious consequences and hurl us toward the edge of an abyss. Yet, why did
he callously overlook how the crusades had summoned this higher power just
prior to extensive slaughter, or how Joshua (for his own gain) invoked Yahweh
to help him bring down the walled city of Jericho? And then there's this unfortunate
truism: "Even the devil can cite scripture for his own agenda".
Several months earlier, on December 26th of
2004, a massive tsunami had devoured thousands of innocent people after two
giant tectonic plates slid past one other near the western coast of Sumatra. So
just how did people unwilling (or unable) to let go of their "faith"
reconcile their belief(s) to this watery tragedy of biblical proportions?
Buddhists: "It's karma; we must generate
lots of good merit to ensure it doesn't happen again".
Hindus: "We must cool the anger of the
local deity through acts of propitiation."
Muslims: "God is testing us to see how
strong our belief in him is".
Christians: "Job had to live through tragedy
and so did Christ on the cross".
For others,
the only way to go about obtaining the factual truth is to take a rigorous
academic approach. Indeed, every one of the world's 'great faiths' has been corrupted by those either
seeking power or with an intent to promote their own culture/agenda. IMO: That is why we must strive to have
separation of church and state...
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