Infancy of Our Intelligence
When I was a child, my family attended church regularly. I served countless masses as an altar boy. It was my nature at a very young age, as it has been all my life, to be observant and contemplative. I observed the restrained and reverential behavior of people in church. They crossed themselves with “holy” water as they entered, bowed, genuflected, stood, kneeled, and prayed in reverent obedience. I also observed, curiously, that many of these same sanctimonious people were often irreverent, insensitive, and sometimes cruel outside of church. I sensed, instinctively, that there was something wrong. I did not yet know the word hypocrisy.
As I continued to observe life, I was struck by how we seemed to complicate it unnecessarily. I thought to myself, “Life is not this complicated. Why do we make it more difficult than it is?” Wherever I went, as the years passed, I observed similar hypocritical and counterproductive behavioral patterns that I found disturbing.
I went on to live a very unusual life of many rich and diverse experiences in a variety of careers. Later in life, I studied at two of the world’s most renowned divinity schools-Yale and Harvard. At the latter, I earned a master of divinity degree. I went to these schools to study ethics, issues associated with global ecological problems, and world religious belief systems. I went to continue on the learning track I had been on all my life. I was fifty years old the year I graduated from Harvard. As an older student, I remained objective in my study and analysis of world religions.
I studied all the major world religions. While they are all interesting and rich in history and rituals, one finds that they remain human constructs formed thousands of years ago in the infancy of our intelligence by people like you and me. The historical context and ancient mindsets that produced these belief systems are abundantly evident. Clearly they are all a part of our very early efforts to understand and cope with the withering and unrelenting demands of life. As such, they should be treated like all other institutions that we have created. Now, ancient and antiquated, these religions should be studied as history not adopted as belief systems.
No disparagement or disrespect is meant by that statement. I appreciate the good efforts of all those who have preceded us honorably. We are no different than they in our quest for life’s ultimate answers. Gandhi said it best when, with great candor, he observed that “Religious ideas are subject to the same laws of evolution that govern everything else in the universe.” In other words, there comes a time to let go of dated ideas and advance as life demands just as we do in every other field of endeavor.
Filed under: Earth and Life, global remedies, quality of life, religion, sustainability
