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October 13, 2013 |
| "All The Evil In The World Has Been Done By Religions" | ||
If you haven't heard someone say "All the evil in the world has been done by religions", you probably will. This is being said more frequently recently because it is the foundational principle of the Coexist movement1. It's possible you have seen the bumper stickers that say "Coexist".
The Coexist movement is dishonest at its core. It hides its true intentions. With a logo that is built from the symbols of three of the major religions you would expect its vision, goals, and initiatives would be related to getting the world's religions to coexist, but they don't mention religion at all. The only way we get a glimpse at their core beliefs is through the programs they consider successes. The following is an example. "We have heard the world famous historian Professor Diarmaid MacCulloch talk about 'The Christian History of Silence,' discussed 'Religion Without God,' and debated what happens in the afterlife." The movement also hides its financial backers.
In this lesson we will look at this founding idea – that most if not all of the evil in the world has been done by religions and that the world would be a better place if all the religions could just live together in peace.
Christianity certainly has a checkered past in the area of doing evil. It's important for Christians to understand what things were done in the name of Christianity and God and why they happened. For a long period Christianity had great authority in the world and it did not represent itself well.
The problems began right from the start with the Church of Rome. From very early on they took it upon themselves to be the defenders of God. Not content to follow Paul's instructions to throw problem people out of the church, the church made it their business to persecute people who did not agree with them. This sometimes went as far as murder.
Around the year 400 AD Christianity became the official religion of the Roman Empire. This gave the Church of Rome authority to do pretty much whatever they wanted. By 550 AD the Roman Empire had collapsed but the church continued on with great authority. They were the maker of kings and the ever present force in every government. This would continue for a thousand years.
During this time the church did all manner of evil. The saying is that "power corrupts" and that was certainly the case in the church. The Apostle Paul said in Ephesians 6:12
12 For our struggle is not against flesh and blood, but against the rulers, against the authorities, against the powers of this dark world and against the spiritual forces of evil in the heavenly realms.
But the church decided to struggle against flesh and blood. They built their own armies and went off to battle. In some cases the armies of the church set off with a specific purpose. But in all cases their general purpose was to enforce the will of the church – and the will of the church was that the enemies of the church would be destroyed.
The main task of the armies of the church was to make war against Muslims. By that time Muslims had taken over most of the former Roman Empire including the land of Israel. Directed by various Popes the armies of the church were sent out on many crusades to take back Israel from the Muslims.
But as always the function of the armies was to fight against the enemies of the church. After the Catholic – Orthodox split in 1054 AD, if the armies of the church were on their way to fight in the Holy Land and they came across some Greek Orthodox Christians they were likely to kill them too. And they were always ready to kill any Jews that they found.2
The Church of Rome was very anti-Semitic from its start.3 Paul's epistle to the Romans deals significantly with the role of Jews in Christianity, but the church ignored his words. Some of its most significant early founders are recorded as having said very hateful things about the Jews. And many of the official pronouncements of the church singled out the Jews in negative ways.
To this day the Christian churches in Israel de-emphasize the cross in the symbols they display. This is because every time someone came to kill Jews they were carrying a cross.
This anti-Semitism continues. Martin Luther, known for the Protestant Reformation, was well known for his anti-Semitic writings. And many of the modern churches, especially the liberal churches, have attitudes toward the Jews that can only be called anti-Semitic.
At various times the people of the church would take it upon themselves to punish the enemies of the church. One example of this was witch trials, where one person would accuse another of being a witch and the people would try to determine if the person was a witch. If they determined it was so, the "witch" would be punished or executed.
The best known of the inquisitions is the Spanish Inquisition. These were departments of the government that were setup to ensure strict adherence to church doctrine. But in fact they often operated to benefit the government through confiscations of property and destruction of potential enemies. The primary targets of the Inquisitions were Jews, Muslims, and Protestants.
The leadership of the church were often very corrupt and the Papacy was treated like a political office … because that is what it was. Some of the Popes were living such un-Christian lives so openly that they had to be removed. Other Popes were completely focused on their political aspirations. Political rivalries were everywhere. The dead bodies of Popes were sometimes exhumed by other Popes and put on trial, and punished.4
This evil continued until the Protestant Reformation. Progressively after that split the Roman Catholic Church lost much of its influence and legal authority. Without that it had less ability to do great evil.
Of course the most basic reason why this happened is the evil that is in mankind. But more specifically what made it possible for this to happen was the structure of the church. The Apostle Paul had described how the church should be organized. It was a lightweight structure that depended more on God leading his people than man. The Apostles had infrequent contact with the churches and therefore could not be directly involved. And Paul showed no interest in trying to merge the individual churches into a larger organization.
The Church of Rome, which became the Roman Catholic Church, was structured in a hierarchy like any government or company. As a result it had a large hierarchy which contained positions of power and authority prized by those who are attracted to them. This structure was used by ruthless ungodly men who worked their way up the hierarchy.
But there was another factor. The Church of Rome declared the Pope to be God's representative on Earth. They also declared that, as such, he was infallible. That produced a situation where people were less likely to criticize him or take action against him.
There were other factors as well. One of these is that Bibles were written by hand and so they were very expensive and very few people had one. Very few people could have read one anyway. Literacy rates were low and the Bibles were only available in Greek or Latin. Therefore most people had to rely on what the church leadership said the Bible said; so they were easily deceived.
Even though its history is not as long Christianity's, Islam is likely to have caused more deaths and evil. Where the various schisms in Christianity resulted in many killings, the killing soon stopped. In Islam the split between Shia and Sunni has resulted in killings that have continued for about 1000 years.
Unlike any other religion, Islam contains a concept that permits the killing of non-Muslims. The idea of Jihad is poorly understood by most non-Muslims. In English we don't have a word that is like it. We have the word 'proselytize' which describes efforts to convert non-Christians to Christianity, but it is limited to non-violent, non-coercive methods. Jihad has no such limits. Its only limit is what is practical for spreading Islam. For example if Muslims in America decided to kill Americans that would not convert to Islam, Islam would be wiped out of America completely.
Most of the other major religions are very focused on peace and it is not natural for them to be involved in violent conflict. When conflicts do occur they are usually more for cultural or political reasons, but religion is mixed in to everything in life and it's easy to view the conflicts as religious. Even so there has been much fighting between other religions
Is it right to blame Christianity for the un-Christian actions of its leaders or members? Nothing they did had any support in the Bible. The question is more complicated than that. From God's perspective each man is responsible for his works. Works like these however defame Christianity in the eyes of the world and interfere with spreading the true gospel message. From the world's perspective these evil deeds provide the excuse the world is looking for to say that Christians are no better than anyone else.
The same question can be asked about Islam. Should Islam be blamed for the un-Islamic actions of its leaders and members.
While the evil actions of one group do not justify the evil actions of another group, it is necessary to make it clear that religions are not the worst offenders. Totalitarianism, including Fascism and Communism, are certainly responsible for more deaths. Communism, in its short history has posted these numbers of deaths.
Fascism, in its even shorter history managed to kill 25 million6
A large church hierarchy provides an opportunity for Satan to plant evil people and do great evil
A world church cannot work without God as its head
Religion can be a very powerful motivator. If a man believes he must act to defend God, great evil is possible
1 http://coexistfoundation.org/about/
2 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusades "On a popular level, the preaching of the First Crusade unleashed a wave of impassioned, personally felt pious Christian fury that was expressed in the massacres of Jews that accompanied and preceded the movement of the crusaders through Europe, as well as the violent treatment of the "schismatic" Orthodox Christians of the east."
3 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christianity_and_antisemitism
4 http://www.toptenz.net/top-10-worst-popes-in-history.php