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IF RELIGION IS MADE UP THEN WHY ARE PEOPLE RELIGIOUS?
John T. Crestwell, Jr.
November 5, 2005

READING:  Religions of Man – Huston Smith

Excerpts from chapter 9:

…IN ALL IMPORTANT RESPECTS THEY (RELIGIONS) ARE THE SAME.  DOES NOT EACH CONTAIN SOME VERSION OF THE GOLDEN RULE?  DO THEY NOT ALL REGARD (MAN’S) HUMANKIND’S SELF-CENTEREDNESS TO BE THE SOURCE OF ITS TROUBLES?

RELIGION IS IMPORTANT; IN RELIGION ALL THE PEOPLES OF THE WORLD ARE FUNDAMENTALLY ALIKE.  THE DIFFERENCES ARE BUT DIALECTS OF A SINGLE SPIRITUAL LANGUAGE THAT EMPLOYS DIFFERENT WORDS BUT EXPRESSES THE SAME IDEAS.

WHAT SHOULD BE OUR APPROACH, THEN, TO THE RELIGIONS OF MAN (HUMANKIND)?  THE ONLY DEFENSIBLE REPLY MUST BE CONTINUED LISTENING, FOR WE HAVE HAD LITTLE MORE THAN A BRIEF GLIMPSE OF THESE FAITHS…  AND WE MUST LISTEN FIRST TO OUR OWN FAITH, FOR EVERY HERITAGE IS INEXHAUSTIBLE AND THE WAYS OF SPIRIT, EVEN AS CHANNELED THROUGH A SINGLE TRADITION, ARE BEYOND THE WIT OF ANYONE TO MASTER COMPLETELY.  

WE MUST LISTEN TO THEM BECAUSE…..OUR TIMES REQUIRE IT.  THE COMMUNITY TODAY CAN BE NO SINGLE TRADITION; IT IS THE PLANET.  DAILY THE WORLD GROWS SMALLER, LEAVING UNDERSTANDING THE ONLY BRIDGE ON WHICH PEACE CAN FIND ITS HOME.  BUT THE ANNIHILATION OF DISTANCE HAS CAUGHT US UNPREPARED.  WHO TODAY STANDS READY TO ACCEPT THE SOLEMN EQUALITY OF NATIONS?  WHO DOES NOT HAVE TO FIGHT AN UNCONSCIOUS TENDENCY TO EQUATE FOREIGN WITH INFERIOR?  WE LIVE IN A GREAT CENTURY, BUT IF IT IS TO RISE TO ITS FULL OPPORTUNITY, THE SCIENTIFIC ACHIEVEMENTS OF ITS FIRST HALF MUST BE MATCHED BY COMPARABLE ACHIEVEMENTS IN HUMAN RELATIONS IN ITS SECOND. THOSE WHO LISTEN, IN THE PRESENT WORLD, WORK FOR PEACE. 

FOR UNDERSTANDING, AT LEAST IN REALMS AS INHERENTLY NOBLE AS THE GREAT FAITHS OF HUMANKIND, (UNDERSTANDING) BRINGS RESPECT, AND RESPECT PREPARES THE WAY FOR A HIGHER POWER, LOVE—THE ONLY POWER THAT CAN QUENCH THE FLAMES OF FEAR, SUSPICION, AND PREJUDICE, AND PROVIDE THE MEANS BY WHICH THE PEOPLES OF THIS GREAT EARTH CAN BECOME ONE TO ONE ANOTHER.

This week I spoke at Wesley Theological Seminary for the UU Chapel service.  They’ve just started giving Wesley UU students opportunities to organize worship services.  The Wesley UU’s asked me to speak on “Why I am a Unitarian Universalist.”  Of course, I was a bit nervous because this is my “I woke up and saw the light” sermon but the light was not the same light Paul saw on that Damascus road you see…  I saw a light of truth that told me that there was a God of many names, which created many questions within me, but only a few answers…  I saw a different light and “you want me to preach this message in a Methodist seminary?  Fine.  I’m sure I won’t get invited back. :)”   The sermon was well received and a few who heard the message stayed afterward for awhile to chat.

I am also reminded of a discussion I had with the professor of the New Testament.  I shared with him that my research led me to believe Paul was a Gnostic.   The Gnostics were another sect of Christianity and they were not literalists.  Scripture was more symbolic and Christ was godly but very human to them… Any how the professor told me that that was “hogwash” and that if I went to Yale, Oxford, Cambridge, or any other seminary, all the NT professors would agree with him.  He then recommended a book he was reading and said, “This book here (pointing to his book) talks a lot about Paul’s authentic Christology and is excellent in showing you that Paul was not a Gnostic…  He then said, “You know, I’ve come to see that you can find whatever you want to find, and if someone wants to prove to themselves a certain point on Jesus then they will…”  Good point I thought. However, as I left, I said to the Professor, “Doctor, did you not find information to prove out your thesis thereby doing the same thing others do!”  He started laughing and I left…

You know, why would a tenured professor who has spent thousands on his education and many hours, why would he reason himself out of his profession?  It pays well, the hours are good, he is constantly reading, writing, critiquing—he’s happy.  Why would he “Come to the edge”, so to speak.   He likes his perception and reality.  I want to get back to that…

Yes, it was there at Wesley Seminary in 1999 that I asked my professor, “What happens to the Hindus, Muslims, and Buddhists at the end of time when Christ judges the living and the dead?  He replied, “I don’t know but God is a God of Grace…”  That was a kind and thoughtful response but it was not enough because it still implied they might not make it.  I wonder if he really heard and understood the deep theological questions that come from his exclusivist implication.  It brought us back to that issue of some saved versus ALL saved. 

Today it is an irrelevant point for me but back then, what he said to me was not enough for me because he implied that “yes other faiths are on the wrong path”; that the folk on the other side of the street were not privy to God’s grace?  Do they not share in the heavenly abundance, if such a thing exists, I thought to myself back then?

You know, there are 827 million of the 1-billion folk in India who call themselves Hindu.  “Professor, have you considered this?”  There are around nearly 415 million Buddhists in the world.  “Professor, have you thought about that?”  There are 1.7 billion (nearly  2 billion) Muslims in the world, what about them?  “What are you saying professor that only 2 billion Christians of the 6.4 billion people on earth are worthy of God’s love and that eternal prize?  Somethin’ ‘aint right!” 

As you may tell, this pushed me over the edge in seminary and led me to want to find a better answer.   And, as many of you know, I found Joseph Campbell and mythology which helped me as I began building my own theology.   I learned mostly in private study that most of religion is hyperbole—exaggeration.  In theology we call it allegory—a vastly exaggerated story but the exaggeration is done to make a point clear.  It’s the moral of the story that’s important, not the story itself.  You can get lost in the literal if you are not careful.  For Campbell, most biblical writings were poetry.   Stories like Jonah and the Whale, Moses parting the Red Sea; the Virgin Birth; the resurrection, the entire book of Revelation, I discovered in my understanding and readings, they were mythological at best.

My question about what happens to the Hindus, Buddhists, and Muslims led me to a place where I had to conclude—religion was made up.   

The natural tendency at that point, is to throw away the old belief.  If the Biblical stories are not true, why read the Bible--so you discard it.  And I did…   But later I would pick the Bible back up but I looked at it much differently.  It was a poetry book full of stories about life.  I even created a cut and paste version of the Bible.  Thomas Jefferson would have been proud.

Recently, I asked myself another question:  If religion is indeed made up, then why are so many people religious?  The Buddhists have their Sutras millions read.  The Taoists read the Tao Te Ching with fervor.  The Jews have their Hebrew scriptures.  The Christians have their Bible, the Muslims their Koran.  They each have millions or even billions of followers.  How can people follow stuff that’s made up?  Why are people literalists when   if they just did simple research, they would see it’s all made-up!  Women cover their heads—why?  Why do follows of some faiths celebrate holidays that were originally pagan?  Don’t they know any better?   I’m being condescending on purposely.

What I’ve discovered is people are literalists for a reason.  People are followers for a reason.  Many are because of culture and their upbringing, we know this but beyond that guess what?  People are religious because IT WORKS!  For my professor of New Testament in seminary, his life is good.  His faith in Jesus is secure because his religion has worked for him in his life.  But it’s when it does not work that we move to another place.  For many millions, their religion work for them.  The brand does not matter.

I’ll never forget, nearly 10 years ago, the night Sharon and I brought JT home from the doctor.  We had spent all day there.  JT had an unusually big soft spot (fontanel).  Somehow it filled with fluid and was very hard and swollen.  It also made him feel bad and he had been lethargic earlier which prompted us to take him to the emergency room.  He was only about six months old at the time.  The doctors put a needle in his head and drained the fluid off.  They patched him up but said we could not go home until his head stopped draining and dripping.  It took a long time for the fluid to drain.  I decided that a miracle needed to occur so in private I said a mighty prayer and “poof” the fluid finally stopped.  Because I was a Christian, I attributed the fluid stopping to Jesus. 

Another time JT at less than a year old had a stomach virus.  It was very difficult watching a baby wrench over and over and over and we were worried.  We took him to the emergency room but basically the doctors said it had to run its course.  That night, once we got home, I prayed over him (another mighty prayer you know) and asked God to, “TAKE THE PAIN FROM J.T. AND GIVE IT TO ME!”  The next day, guess who was throwing up? Yep.  I was sick as a dog!   I went to church that Sunday and told the church the story and many praised the Lord.

You could say that in both cases time played an issue.  The dripping fontanel eventually would have stopped and basically JT infected me with the stomach virus.  It had nothing to do with prayer a skeptic would say.  But if I am raised in a particular faith and I am a believer in that faith, I am naturally going to give credit to my religion even if it had nothing to do with it.  The Buddhist would have said, “Thank you Buddha,” the Hindu—“Thank you Krishna,” the Muslim, “Thank you Muhammad.”  I said, at that time in my life, “Thank you Lord.”

In this case here, we can see that perception is reality.  Religion working is perception.  You know, when I say that to some people, they say back to me,“No John.  I KNOW FOR A FACT MY RELIGION WORKS AND IS REAL!”  I say to them, “I know it works for you and is real to you but do not discount the power of perception and belief!”  The mind has great power!!    And I say to you, “DO NOT DISCOUNT THE POWER OF PERCEPTION AND BELIEF!  It may be that our gods come to life right there!

It is not that one faith is better than the other.  It is not that one works better than the other, but rather, healings and miracles happen all over the world and would happen even if religion did not exist.   Where there is a believer, there is a religious miracle attributed to a practitioner’s faith.  But without the faith there is still the miracle.

In the Methodist Church I grew up in, my preacher would say, “When you pray John, God has three answers: “Yes, no, or not now.”  I said to the preacher, “IT SEEMS GOD HAS COVERED ALL THE OPTIONS!”

For me, life is the master healer and miracle worker.  Life giveth and taketh away, no matter the faith.  Life provides miracles and also misery.  Life says, “Yes, no, or not now.” And the Atheist and Agnostic also get this message.  With that said, religion works.  Prayer works; meditation works, thinking positively works…. There is a power in the mind and a universal cosmic energy that moves and stirs and pricks our consciousness and it does every now and then send us miracles that cannot be explained.   But this power cannot be boxed in.  It’s “so high you can’t get over it, so low you can’t get under it, so wide you can’t get around it.”  It is the creative sustaining force in the Universe.

Buddhists are not Buddhists just because they grew up Buddhists.  Many are faithful to their traditions because through years of practice they have found a wonderful bliss in trying to be the best Buddhist or Hindu or Muslim they could be.   It does not matter what religion you practice. 

You have to find the one that meets your sociological, psychological and theological needs.  You are here so I guess you have chosen Unitarian Universalism.  The best thing we can do is be the best Unitarian Universalists we can be; to make our faith work for us.  I like what Huston Smith said, “WE MUST LISTEN FIRST TO OUR OWN FAITH, FOR EVERY HERITAGE IS INEXHAUSTIBLE AND THE WAYS OF SPIRIT, EVEN AS CHANNELED THROUGH A SINGLE TRADITION, ARE BEYOND THE WIT OF ANYONE TO MASTER COMPLETELY.  

We have so much to learn, even within our own faith tradition; so many miracles, so many mysteries to contemplate. So much to discover that we need NOT spend our time proving our faith is better than the other or proving we are the best and they are the worse.  The world is much too much small now; much too much small now to think our faith is THE FAITH; that our faith is, as I put it often, THE BE ALL AND END ALL OF EXISTENCE.  The world is much too much small now to think “that whichis foreign is inferior.”  “THE DIFFERENCES in religions ARE BUT DIALECTS OF A SINGLE SPIRITUAL LANGUAGE THAT EMPLOYS DIFFERENT WORDS BUT EXPRESSES THE SAME IDEAS,” that’s what Huston Smith said.  So the crescent and cross must quench their thirst for power by seeing ultimately their higher power calls them to a higher love and mutual respect.  We are one.   

Why are people religious?  People are religious because their religion works for them-- but there is no exclusive theology.  There is no religion that works or is better than the others.    To my professor if you can hear me (I know you can’t but if you could) with all the respect I can muster, I want to say to you this (and to all of you):  the Spirit of Life is much bigger than any religion’s exclusive claim, as far as I’m concerned.  Perception is reality with religion.

We waste too much time attempting to prove our religion is better.  You can get a PhD in “Apologetics” showing how one faith is better than the other. There are millions of books that have been written to prove one faith is better.  But, I thank something else is better.  Creating a world of mutuality and reciprocity—that is better.  Seeing the beauties in life—that is better—enjoying the many pastimes and hobbies in life—that is better; enjoying my loving relationships, that is better!  And I think giving thanks for each day as a blessing—as a day to experience and learn more about my faith, my life and living, that is much better than spending time learning how to prove my faith is better than yours.  Life is too short to hate.

And so stand with me at this time and sing, with a joyful heart, WE GIVE THANKS (it is an insert in your order of service). We do give thanks for this day to celebrate life once again… 

Thank you for your time this morning. Please stand.  Amen.

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