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Monday, August 11, 2014

Looking to the East, to confirm the direction of the West (Church & State Relation's)



Something is going on that has happened before, it has happened multiple times throughout the centuries.  This is the question of secularism vs. religious belief in the West.  

Why do I say look East?  Look and see what is happening in Iraq, in the current day, but in many parts of the Middle East.  There are groups, whose main aim is fueled by their religious fundamentalism are attacking people, Muslims, Christians and other religious minorities whom they deem in the way of their "True" Religion.

For centuries we can look to the west in many of the conquests; crusades, 30 years war, conflict in Northen Ireland conquests which no doubt had a lot more than pure "religious" intentions when you dig  into them, but they were brought up, in context, a clear religious fervor to them.

Stedily in the West there has been an errosion of the influence of "Religion in the State", for someone who is religious, I would argue, against what many "Western Religious" leaders would argue that this is a positive thing for religious people for whom peace is at its core.  In fact in many cases I would say the separation of Church and State is exactly what is needed to allow various faith traditions to flourish.

I would argue that in the West, not without its issues, because the causes of time and the theological thought has never been a fluid thig, the  rise of the secular state allows for the most free flowing practice of religion.  

One example is that in my travels of the West, people have the greatest opportunity to practice their faith: "Freely, openly and if done peacefully without much interference".  This allows thought's to flow, many religious people don't like this, but secular states have allowd this.  If you look to France, there has bee a renaissance of Eastern Orthodox Christian thought, more so than in the lands of many of these confession's where they originated from.  In Germany, you have countless examples of Islamic Scholors who have been able to take a deeper view of their faith, where they could not do this in their own land.  In The Netherlands, one land where Calvinism has fourished it has been a heavily diverse nation with many beliefs but because of their separation, Calvinistic ideas have come to grow.

Going back to my point, if Western Society continues to march forward and Separate Church and State, with the aim that all should be free to practice their own religion, I think it has a humanizing effect, not the other way around.  I have no illusion's that many Christian and other faiths will vehemently argue otherwise, yet ask a Yazidi person in Norther Iraq or a Christian in Mosul how much they want to see the "State be more Religious", no one would answer that, they don't have freedom to practice anything similar to that while a "religious purist" imposes their faith in "society".



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