But before I delve into this story, let me start with a little background about me.
I was raised and baptized in the Presbyterian church. From birth until the first half of sixth grade I attended the Westminister partition. After that point we switched to Presbyterian USA, mostly because most of my friends from school were involved in the youth group there. When I left to go to GSSM, I struggled to find a church that fit and stopped going as regularly until I started attending the local St. Bartholomew Episcopal Church (a.k.a. St. Bart's).
During my time at GSSM I struggled a lot with my faith. I was constantly in a world of science and math and logic and reason. As scientists, we can never assume anything with absolute proof. Faith is the exact opposite as it expects you to accept it without any proof whatsoever. To make matters worse, I was also coming to terms with my own sexuality, which really didn't help me "feel the love of God" very often. I don't remember the exact day but there was a point during high school where I feel out of touch with God and turned my back on Him. I decided I was better at knowing what was right and wrong and set out to find my own truth.
I've read a lot about different religions. This knowledge has grown along with my studies in Japanese culture, which is essentially a mix and match of every major world religion from the oldest (their native Shinto) to Buddhism and even Christianity. But there was still something about the monotheistic Abraham traditions that appealed to me and I felt like the questions I kept asking were pointing me down this path.
However, in the back of my mind I always had a hard time accepting that good people couldn't go to Heaven if they simply weren't Christian. When I was 13 I asked my mum if a pacificst Buddhist monk who had never killed a living thing and dedicated his life to peace and goodwill to others would go Hell while a man who had committed heinous crimes but converted on his deathbed would go to Heaven. At that time she said she didn't know the answer to that question.
Years later, while I'm struggling with this internal debate over my faith, she asked me if I remembered that question during a car ride to school. She said that first off, she did not have the authority to answer that question. Humans are not able to judge others, only God can do that. She said however if she were to make an educated guess that perhaps the Buddhist was unknowingly more Christian than the convict so maybe God would take that into consideration.
During training I learned that Islam is in fact has a perennialistic view on religion as a whole. The professor said he believed that "God has many faces" and the different world religions demonstrate the multiple perspectives of the same God. I mean even in Christianity we view God as being simultaneously three parts while still remaining fully God. Whose to say that this may be a limited view?
The greatest evidence for one united theology is the most basic concept present in all religions.
The Golden Rule: "Do unto others as you would have them do unto you."
And if you don't believe me, here's a quote from the Dalai Lama:
"Every religion emphasizes human improvement, love, respect for others, sharing other people's suffering. On these lines every religion had more or less the same viewpoint and the same goal."
So as I stood there holding the Qur'an with my friend Arjamand, I couldn't help but feel how similar our religions were. I don't know why there's wars and fighting going on over different beliefs. Or why one has to be more right than the other.
All I know is that I'm really starting to explore a perennialistic view of Christianity.
James S. Cutsinger: “Though truly incarnate as Jesus Christ in Christianity, he is salvifically operative in and through non-Christian religions as well. In some he is present in an equally personal way, as in Krishna and the other Hindu avatars, in whom he was also ‘made man’, while in others he appears in an impersonal way, as in the Qur’an of Islam, where he made himself book.”
Bowden, John Stephen. "Perennial Philosophy and Christianity." In Christianity: the complete guide .
London: Continuum, 2005. p.5.
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