How Religious Fundamentalism and Secularism Shape Politics and Human Rights

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Last week’s blog addressed the conflict between individual rights and the collective obligations all people have for one another.  Fundamentalist religions and secular authoritarian regimes resolve that conflict by eliminating individual rights with a religious or political ideal and imposing oppressive laws.  So it was with Cotton Mather’s 17^th century Puritans in New England, with Communists in the 20^th century, and with today’s radical Islamists like ISIS and al-Qaeda.

            Roger Cohen has asked: What leads young European Muslims in the thousands to give up lives in France, Britain or Germany, enlist in …the Islamic State, and dedicate themselves to the unlikely aim of establishing a caliphate backed by digital propaganda?  Cohen acknowledges that we don’t know the answer why the violent rejection of modernity and the extreme, literalist interpretation of certain teachings of Sunni Islam have “…proved of unquenchable appeal.”  He suggests one reason may be that the freedoms of libertarian democracies have all but eliminated traditional moral boundaries, allowing people to do what they want without concern for others.

            Absolute freedom is anarchy, but the absence of freedom is tyranny.  The challenge for libertarian democracies is to balance individual rights with providing for the common good.  Religion can help the process by providing the moral standards of legitimacy that balance individual freedom with collective obligations to provide for the common good, but fundamentalist religions distort the process with sacred ideals and laws that eliminate freedom. 

            Secularism is an antidote for religious fundamentalism.  It does not exclude religion from politics, but prohibits government from favoring any religion to protect libertarian human rights.    Secularism considers advances in knowledge and reason in shaping standards of legitimacy that balance religious ideals with the secular ideals of politics.  Human rights are critically important, but they only define what government cannot do, not what government can or should do to provide for the common good.  That is the province of democratic politics and religion.

            Fundamental human rights begin with the freedoms of religion and speech, and they are defined and protected as universal human rights under the International Covenant of Civil and Political Rights (ICCPR).  Economic and social needs are also treated as human rights under the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights (ICESCR); but government benefits cannot be universally enforced as rights since they depend on a nation’s capability to provide them.  As a result government benefits must remain a national political responsibility.

            The U.S. is a party to the ICCPR (signed in 1977 and ratified in 1992), but not to the ICESCR.  Most Islamic nations in the Middle East and Africa embrace Islamic law, or shari’a, and have an Islamic version of human rights law that subjects human rights to shari’a.  The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam of 1990 condones apostasy and blasphemy laws that deny the freedoms of religion and speech, and shari’a condones discrimination against women and religious minorities.  Islamic scholars have debated issues of justice and human rights in Islam, but there is no consensus on providing libertarian human rights or eliminating discrimination against women and non-Muslims, so shari’a reigns supreme over libertarian human rights.

            Unlike Muslims in Islamic cultures, those in libertarian democracies have come to appreciate the freedoms of religion and speech and equal treatment of women and religious minorities.  Those progressive Muslims have not lost their religion, they have only secularized it—much like their Jewish and Christian neighbors.  They consider politics and law the province of man, not God, and know that if government is controlled by any religion there can be no freedom of religion or speech.  The secularization of religion thus allows the fundamental freedoms that are at the heart of libertarian democracies, but that are missing in Islamic cultures.

            Secularism acknowledges advances in knowledge and reason as sources of truth, while religious fundamentalism rejects any advances in knowledge or reason that challenges the truth of God’s will as revealed in its holy scripture—the Hebrew Bible for Jews, the Christian Bible for Christians, and the Qur’an for Muslims.  Such a conflict came to a head in the 1925 Scopes Monkey Trial in Tennessee, where the teaching of evolution challenged the Biblical creation story.  And the issue is not resolved; Christian fundamentalists continue to promote the teaching of Biblical creationism along with scientific evolution in public schools. 

            In their search for truth, progressive believers use inductive reasoning to accept advances in knowledge and reason, but also use deductive reasoning to retain belief in ancient mystical truths such as eternal life that remain beyond knowledge and reason.  By way of contrast, fundamentalists rely entirely on the unyielding truths of their ancient holy scriptures.

           

            Religions are expected to grow worldwide even as they shrink in libertarian democracies, and secularism is necessary to enable Islam to embrace the freedoms of religion and speech that are necessary for Muslims to debunk the demagoguery of ISIS.  While the excesses of liberty can be a license for immorality, liberty in law is essential to enable reason and truth to prevail over religious demagoguery.  That is why religious fundamentalists are a minority among believers in the U.S., while they are majority in Islamic cultures that have no freedom of religion or speech.  Secularism can provide the needed balance between libertarian human rights and the moral imperative to provide for the common good.  It is expressed in the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself—even one’s unbelieving neighbors.

             

Notes and References to Resources:     

Previous blogs on related topics are: Religion and Reason, December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Religion and Human Rights, February 22, 2015; God and Country: Resolving Conflicting Concepts of Sovereignty, March 29, 2015; A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015. 

Roger Cohen has asked why the propaganda of ISIS trumps the freedom of libertarian democracies for many young Muslims.  See http://www.nytimes.com/2015/08/14/opinion/roger-cohen-why-isis-trumps-freedom.html?smprod=nytcore-ipad&smid=nytcore-ipad-share&_r=0.

On religion and secularism, Alan Wolfe has argued “…religion’s priority of belief and secularism’s commitment to individual rights are not in opposition; rather they complement each other.”  He believes that secular values are essential to the survival of religion in the modern era.  See http://www.theatlantic.com/magazine/archive/2008/03/and-the-winner-is/306654/. 

Ken Gibson has stated that Islam is not the problem.  Islamism is.  “Secularism, the separation of politics and religion, is the only force that can deliver a peaceful accommodation [of politics and religion].”  And Gibson concludes, Extremism is religion’s enemy.  Secularism is its ally. See http://www.irishtimes.com/opinion/ken-gibson-secularism-is-religion-s-ally-against-extremes-1.2305739. 

On how the U.S. has promoted democracy, human rights and the rule of law in its foreign policy, see generally, Military Legitimacy: Might and Right in the New Millennium, chapter 4 in the Resources.  On the differing opinions of Islamic scholars on justice and human rights, see Religion, Legitimacy and the Law: Shari’a, Democracy and Human Rights at pages 10-17 in the Resources.  On the separation of church and state from a Christian and Muslim perspective, see Church and state: conflicting concepts of sovereignty in The Teachings of Jesus and Muhammad on Morality and Law: the Heart of Legitimacy at page 57 in the Resources. 

Craig Stern has explained why libertarian or negative human rights under the ICCPR are enforceable, while economic entitlements or positive human rights under the ICESCR are not, and why the latter can corrupt the former as part of the rule of law.  See Craig A. Stern, Human Rights and the Rule of Law—the Choice for East Africa, SSRN, March 6, 2015, at http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2574823.  On democracy, human rights and fundamentalism, and differing views of Islamic scholars, see Barnes, Religion, Legitimacy and the Law: Shari’a,Democracy and Human Rights at pages 2-18.  Mark R. Amstutz  has noted “The limited consensus on human rights doctrines, coupled with the ever-expanding list of rights, has had a deleterious effect on the moral foundations and priority of international human rights claims.” And that human rights provide “…norms that if not fulfilled by a state can undermine its international legitimacy.” Amstutz, International Ethics: Concepts, Theories and Cases in Global Politics, Third Edition, Rowman & Littlefield Publishers, Inc., 2008, pp 97-99.  

Articles 18, 19 and 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948) provide for the freedom of religion and free expression, and Articles 18, 19 and 20 of the ICCPR make those rights a matter of international law.  The Cairo Declaration on Human Rights in Islam of 1990 has no provisions comparable to Articles 18, 19 and 20 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights or the ICCPR, but following a Preamble that asserts the primacy of Shari’a in defining human rights, Article 11 provides in part: Human beings are born free, and no one has the right to enslave, humiliate, oppress or exploit them, and there can be no subjugation but to God the Most-High….  Article 18 provides in part: Everyone shall have the right to live in security for himself, his religion, his dependents, his honour and his property….  Article 22 provides: (a) Everyone shall have the right to express his opinion freely in such manner as would not be contrary to the principles of the Shari’ah.  (b) Everyone shall have the right to advocate what is right, and propagate what is good, and warn against what is wrong and evil according to the norms of Islamic Shari’ah. (c) Information is a vital necessity to society.  It may not be exploited or misused in such a way as may violate sanctities and the dignity of Prophets, undermine moral and ethical values or disintegrate, corrupt or harm society or weaken its faith. (d) It is not permitted to arouse nationalistic or doctrinal hatred or to do anything that may be an incitement to any form of racial discrimination.  Article 24 provides specifically what the Preamble implies: All the rights and freedoms stipulated in this Declaration are subject to the Islamic Shari’ah.  Article 25 provides: The Islamic Shari’ah is the only source of reference for the explanation or clarification to any of the articles of this Declaration.

The Scopes Monkey Trial was an American legal case in 1925 in which a substitute high school teacher, John Scopes, was accused of violating Tennessee's Butler Act, which made it unlawful to teach human evolution in any state-funded school.  Scopes was unsure whether he had ever actually taught evolution, but he purposely incriminated himself so that the case could have a defendant.  Scopes was found guilty and fined $100 (equivalent to $1,345 in 2015), but the verdict was overturned on a technicality. The trial served its purpose of drawing intense national publicity. William Jennings Bryan, three-time presidential candidate, argued for the prosecution, while Clarence Darrow, the famed defense attorney, spoke for Scopes. The trial publicized the Fundamentalist–Modernist Controversy, which set Modernists [Secularists], who said evolution was not inconsistent with religion, against Fundamentalists, who said the word of God as revealed in the Bible took priority over all human knowledge. The case was thus seen as both a theological contest and a trial on whether modern science regarding the creation–evolution controversy should be taught in schools. See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scopes_Trial.

Balancing Individual Rights with Collective Responsibilities

By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            The Enlightenment of the 18^th century was akin to the tree of knowledge in the Garden of Eden.  Its libertarian political theories and advances in knowledge and reason were the forbidden fruit that opened the eyes of humanity to a secular truth that debunked traditional religion.  Since then libertarian democracies in the West have evolved into more secular cultures in which individual rights have been given primacy over the collective obligations of traditional religion. 

            Progressive believers in the libertarian democracies of the West have adapted their faith to advances in knowledge and the libertarian values of the Enlightenment, and they outnumber religious fundamentalists who have resisted any modernization of their religion by insisting on the absolute truth of their ancient scriptures.  Progressive believers are a minority in the Islamic East, where most Muslims are literal fundamentalists who believe the Qur’an is the perfect and immutable word of God and that God is the only lawmaker, so that Islamic law, or shari’a, precludes the man-made law of libertarian democracies.  

 

            Ancient Jewish and Islamic laws emphasize the collective responsibility of all believers to provide for the common good, especially caring for the poor and needy, but do not mention individual human rights, probably because individual rights were irrelevant in those ancient times.  But today individual rights, beginning with the freedoms of religion and speech, are recognized to be as essential to the common good as social welfare programs, and in libertarian democracies religions have made individual rights a matter of faith as well as law.  That is not the case in Islamist regimes where shari’a imposes apostasy and blasphemy laws that deny the freedoms of religion and speech.    

            Reconciling any fundamentalist religion—whether it is Jewish, Christian or Islamic—with individual rights requires that its religious rules are voluntary moral standards rather than coercive laws.  Both moral standards and laws are standards of legitimacy that reflect the norms of right and wrong.  Apostasy and blasphemy laws prevent the freedoms of religion and speech, and any meaningful political freedom must begin with those freedoms.  Likewise, true faith requires the freedoms of religion and speech.  Religion cannot be mandated or protected by law.

            Like Jews and Christians, most Muslims in libertarian democracies support individual rights and a secular rule of law and do not seek to impose shari’a on others.  Libertarian values have reformed fundamentalist religions in the West, and they could do the same in Islamic cultures.  Such a libertarian reformation could counter the violence of radical Islamism since its legitimacy depends upon the acquiescence of a silent majority of fundamentalist Muslims.

            But there is a fly in this ointment.  The individual rights of libertarian democracies are invariably associated with ugly excesses of liberty and immorality.  That is the nature of a free society, and it understandably offends devout believers.  Fundamentalist religions make immoral acts like adultery crimes that are often punished by death.  That may prevent immoral acts, but it also prevents any real freedom, and history has shown that the suppression of individual freedom with religious laws has done more harm than good.

 

            The individual freedoms in libertarian democracies should provide equal opportunity for all to share the privileges of power, but wealth and power in the U.S. has become increasingly concentrated in the hands of a privileged few whose unrestrained greed now threatens the political stability of democracy.  The health of any democracy depends on a strong middle class, and the traditionally healthy middle class in the U.S. is now threatened by a particularly aggressive and obnoxious form of neo-libertarian demagoguery exemplified by Donald Trump.      

            Trump’s bombastic politics appeal to neo-libertarians who want to make individual rights absolute and avoid any obligation to provide for the common good.  They are joined by Christian fundamentalists who have sullied the freedom of religion by using it to justify discrimination against those who they consider to be sinners, including homosexuals.  It appears that the altruistic Christian ethic in the U.S. is being superseded by the sanctimonious selfishness of Ayn Rand’s objectivism, now represented by the realty-show politics of Donald Trump. 

            The fabric of American democracy has always depended on a strong middle class to hold together the many diverse threads of its population.  That fabric could become unraveled, as it did in the Civil War, with the decline of a middle class that shares common values.  To ensure a future for American democracy people of faith and reason need to restore a sense of collective responsibility for the common good that is threatened by an emphasis on individual and group rights, and prevent any further erosion of America’s middle class. 

            Neo-libertarian politics that favor special interests, whether defined by wealth, race, political party or religion and that seek to trump the collective responsibility to provide for the common good with individual or group rights are morally wrong.  For the U.S. to preserve the fabric of its democracy and represent a model of libertarian democracy for the rest of the world, it must demonstrate that it has the moral strength to balance individual rights with the collective responsibility to provide for the common good; and religion can help in the effort by emphasizing a common word of faith in the greatest commandment to love God and neighbor.   

Notes and References to Resources:      

Previous blogs on related topics are: Faith and Freedom, December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, January 11, 2015; Religion and Human Rights, February 22, 2015; Wealth, Politics, Religion and Economic Justice, March 8, 2015; A Fundamental Problem with Religion, May 3, 2015; Religion, Human Rights and National Security, May 10, 2015; Liberation from Economic Oppression, May 31, 2015; The Future of Religion: In Decline and Growing, June 7, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, June 14, 2015; Fear and Fundamentalism, July 26, 2015; Freedom and Fundamentalism, August 2, 2015.  

The Qur’an provides: Let there be no compulsion in religion.  Truth stands out clear from Error.  Whoever rejects Evil and believes in Allah has grasped the most trustworthy hand-hold that never breaks.  And Allah hears and knows all things.  (Qur’an, Al Baqara 2:256)  All laws enforced by the state are compulsive and coercive.  Shari’a imposes both apostasy and blasphemy laws that deny any freedom of religion or speech, which is compulsion in religion.  Shari’a also imposes other forms of compulsion or coercion that deny equal rights with laws that discriminate against women and non-Muslims. 

In Secrets of the extreme religious right: Inside the frightening world of Christian Reconstructionism, Salon, July 31, 2015, Paul Rosenberg has described how fundamentalist Christian Reconstructionists promote a concept of religious freedom derived from the Hobby Lobby Supreme Court decision that justifies otherwise unlawful discrimination.  See        http://www.salon.com/2015/07/31/secrets_of_the_extreme_religious_right_inside_the_frightening_world_of_christian_reconstructionism/. 

                   

Freedom and Fundamentalism

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Freedom and fundamentalism were both latecomers to religion.  The individual freedom that has become a sacred political and religious value in libertarian democracies is derived from natural law, not theology, and came with the Enlightenment more than 250 years ago.  Religious fundamentalism was a reaction to the threat of change posed by the advances in knowledge and reason of the Enlightenment.  Moses, Jesus and Muhammad taught a collective ethic and never mentioned individual freedom; and since religious fundamentalism is based on maintaining the absolute truth of ancient scriptures, fundamentalists give short shrift to individual freedom.

            Moses and Muhammad taught the primacy of God’s law as the standard of righteousness, while Jesus planted the seeds of freedom with his teachings on love over law.  Even with their differences, the greatest commandment to love God and neighbor is a common word of Judaism, Christianity and Islam.  John’s first letter goes further to equate God with love (I John 4:16), and John’s Gospel presents Jesus as the Logos, the word of God [or love] made flesh (John 1:1-14). 

            The principle of love over law taught by Jesus opened the door to individual freedom for ancient Jews, and the Apostle Paul affirmed that in his letter to the Roman church: “The commandments…are summed up in this one rule: ‘Love your neighbor as yourself.’  Love does no harm to its neighbor.  Therefore love is the fulfillment of the law.” (Romans 13:8-10)  Paul struggled with the relationship of free will and Jewish law, and understood that true faith and love for others could not be made obligatory by law. (Romans 3:19-28; 7:4-60; Galatians 5:1-14)  Paul never mentioned human rights, but he recognized that true faith required freedom of choice.  It required choosing to repent and to accept the transforming power of God’s forgiving love and grace.    

            St. Augustine elaborated on the theme of faith and love over law: “…If a commandment is kept through fear of punishment and not for love of righteousness, it is kept slavishly, not freely, and therefore is not [truly] kept at all.  For fruit is good only if it grows from the root of love.”  The writings of Paul and St. Augustine are based on scripture; but the Enlightenment challenged ancient scriptural truth with the new secular values of individual rights and freedom.

 

            Hugo Grotius (1583-1645) and John Locke (1632-1704) were both theologians and political theorists who invoked natural law and reason rather than revelation as the guiding principles of political theory.   Grotius is considered the father of international law, and in The Law of War and Peace (1625) he debunked the divine right to rule with the secular concept of sovereignty that provided for the political independence and integrity of each nation.  Locke developed the social contract theory of democracy, with constitutional civil rights to have primacy over more dynamic laws to protect minorities from the tyranny of a majority. 

            Both Grotius and Locke acknowledged that natural law and reason were distinct from Christian theology, but they saw no conflict between natural law, reason and God’s moral law.  The natural law of the Enlightenment liberated people from the divine right of royalty to rule with democratic governance and asserted the right of all people to inalienable human rights, beginning with the freedoms of religion and speech.  Democracy, human rights and reason required that religious norms be voluntary standards of legitimacy rather than coercive laws.              

           

            In 17^th century America, the Puritans ignored the primacy of love over law and established a fundamentalist theocracy in New England, complete with blasphemy laws.  Roger Williams reacted to this oppression of religious freedom by advocating a “wall of separation between the Garden of the church and the wilderness of the world (or government).”    Williams believed that the church had been corrupted when Constantine made Christianity the religion of the Roman Empire in the 4^th century.  Williams promoted freedom of religion to save the church from the corrupt powers of the state.  It would be another century before Jefferson took up the cause to protect individual liberty from the powers of both church and state. 

            In his tour of America in 1831, Alexis De Tocqueville noted the oppression of Puritan fundamentalism: “The legislator, forgetting completely the great principles of religious liberty he himself demanded in Europe, forces attendance at divine service by fear of fines, and he goes as far as to strike with severe penalties, and often death, Christians who wish to worship God according to a form other than his.”

           

            The fundamental freedoms of the Enlightenment are consistent with the love of God and neighbor, but those freedoms have evolved into a culture of self-centered greed, materialism and hedonism that conflicts with the moral imperative to love others.  It is understandable that the excesses of freedom have caused Muslim fundamentalists to be skeptical of freedom, but their apostasy and blasphemy laws have done more harm, preventing the free will needed for true faith, as in 17^th century New England and in Islamic cultures today.  Faith cannot be coerced by outlawing immorality; the freedom to sin is a prerequisite for true faith. 

            Fundamentalist Islam in the Middle East today is similar to 17^th century Christian fundamentalism in New England, with its blasphemy laws and execution of unbelievers.  But there are progressive Islamic scholars like Abdullahi Ahmed An-Na’im who recognize that true faith requires religious freedom, and that the coercive laws of shari’a must be considered voluntary standards of legitimacy in order to be compatible with the fundamental freedoms of international human rights law, beginning with the freedoms of religion and speech.

            Freedom cannot coexist with religious fundamentalism, but freedom without religion can be carried too far.  Libertarian democracies have emphasized individual rights to the detriment of providing for the common good, but Islamic cultures are at the other end of the spectrum, denying the freedoms of religion and speech with apostasy and blasphemy laws in the name of protecting Islam and providing for the common good.  Both cultures need to balance individual rights with providing for the common good, and both have a long way to go.

Notes and References to Resources:

Related blogs: Religion and Reason, posted January 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, posted December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, posted January 11, 2015; Love over Law, posted January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is there a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? posted January 25, 2015;  Religion and Human Rights, posted February 22, 2015; and Fear and Fundamentalism, posted July 26, 2015.

On Saint Augustine, see The Spirit and the Letter, pp 11, 26, 64, cited in Tony Lane, Harpers Concise Book of Christian Faith, Harper & Row, San Francisco, 1984, pp 43, 111, 112.

On Cotton Mather’s Puritan fundamentalism, the reaction of Roger Williams, and the observations of Alexis De Tocqueville, see Jon Meacham, American Gospel, Random House, New York, 2006, pages 52-56.

On freedom of choice in faith, Abdullahi Ahmed On An Na’im has said: “There should be no penal or other negative legal consequences for apostasy and all of the related concepts [e.g. blasphemy] from an Islamic perspective, because belief in Islam presupposes and requires the freedom of choice and can never be valid under coercion or intimidation.” Na’im, Islam and the Secular State, Harvard University Press, 2008, p. 122.  For a discussion of free will and religion and the divergent views of Na’im and other Islamic scholars on democracy and human rights, see Barnes, Religion, Legitimacy and the Law: Shari’a, Democracy and HumanRights, pages 3-5 and 10-17, in Resources.

Fear and Fundamentalism

By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Webster defines fundamentalism as “Religious beliefs based on a literal interpretation of the Bible.”  Religious fundamentalism is not limited to Christianity.  There are fundamentalist Jews with their Hebrew Bible (the Old Testament in the Christian Bible) and fundamentalist Muslims with their Qur’an.  In these Religions of the Book, fundamentalism defines and limits God’s word in a sacred holy book.  That makes literal fundamentalism a form of idolatry.

            Fundamentalist Jews believe that the ancient dictates of the Torah (Mosaic Law) as set forth in Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers and Deuteronomy remain God’s law today, just as fundamentalist Christians believe the Bible is the inerrant and infallible word of God, and Muslim fundamentalists believe that the Qur’an is the word of God made Book. 

            Fundamentalist Jews and Christians are a minority in their faiths while most Muslims are fundamentalists who believe that the Qur’an is God/Allah’s perfect and immutable truth.  Fundamentalist Muslims and Christians are also exclusivists who believe that their religion is the one true faith and that all unbelievers are condemned by God to eternal damnation.

            Religious fundamentalism originated in the 19^th century as the product of fear—the fear of dynamic advances in knowledge and reason that challenged the truth of traditional religious doctrines.  The fear of progress and modernity fostered religious beliefs grounded in the certainty of ancient scriptures and doctrines that were immune to change.  Religious fundamentalism puts God’s word in a holy box where it gives believers a sense of security against the unsettling changes that have come with progress and modernity.

 

            Lovett Weems has referred to Christian fundamentalism as bibliolotry, and that principle of biblical idolatry applies to Jews and Muslims who believe their holy books are the perfect and unchanging word of God.  Weems, like most Christian pastors, considers the Bible the final authority in matters of faith and practice but not the inerrant and infallible word of God; and while Christians consider the teachings of Jesus to be God’s word, there is no verbatim record of his teachings.  The four Gospels are the only source of his teachings, and they should be read critically since they were put on the lips of Jesus by evangelists in the early church.

            The danger of Christian and Islamic fundamentalism is a zealous exclusivism that can motivate believers into being aggressive instruments of a vengeful and judgmental God who condemns unbelievers to hell.  That danger can be alleviated by a faith that understands the mystical and universal power of God through experience and reason.  The Discipline of the United Methodist Church explains this function of a dynamic faith in Our Theological Task.

            John Wesley lived and preached in England over 250 years ago.  He was ahead of his times but behind ours.  Wesley admired John Locke, but he was skeptical of democracy and opposed to American independence.  Even so, Wesley liberated the Anglican religion from its bondage to stiff-necked doctrines with the teachings of Jesus on God’s love and mercy.  Wesley and his Methodists put heart into Anglicanism, and in the process likely prevented a violent revolution that was building in Great Britain against Dickensian excesses of capitalism.

            John Wesley developed the ideas incorporated in the Wesleyan Quadrilateral.  It provides the four elements of Our Theological Task which urge the use of tradition, experience and reason in interpreting scripture.  This enlightened way of understanding scripture prevents believers from succumbing to the temptation of fundamentalism and its false sense of security in the literal meaning of ancient scripture as God’s inerrant and infallible word; but even within Methodism the Confessing Movement advocates more fundamentalist beliefs.

            Fundamentalism is absurd to those who have accepted advances of knowledge and reason on their journey of faith.  But there is reason to worry about fundamentalism in the world in which Christianity and Islam represent over half of the world’s population, and Islam is expected to overtake Christians as the world’s largest religion by 2070.  Unless Islam becomes less fundamentalist, we can expect to see more fear, religious polarization and violence in the future.

            Radical fundamentalists who are committed to kill unbelievers in the name of God represent a clear and present danger to humanity and must be captured or killed.  But we should seek to reconcile with fundamentalists who have not yet allowed their beliefs to justify violence. Both approaches are based on the greatest commandment to love God and others as ourselves which is found in the Hebrew Bible, was taught by Jesus, and offered by Muslim scholars as a common word of faith.  Love for others supports both eliminating those who would do harm to others, and reconciling with those who wish to live in peace in a universal family of God.

            Religious reconciliation based on a common word of faith can defeat the fear of religious fundamentalism and the violence that it spawns, but it requires understanding one’s neighbor to include unbelievers—even apostates—as illustrated in the story of the good Samaritan.  Sharing a common love of God and neighbor does not resolve all religious differences, but it provides a fundamental common value of faith that enables all believers to overcome fear and be reconciled as spiritual brothers and sisters in the family of God and in the unity of all believers.

            Remember: God is love. And …There is no fear in love.  (I John 4:16-18)

Notes and References to Resources:

See Blog/Archives for related blogs: Religion and Reason, posted December 8, 2014; Faith and Freedom, posted December 15, 2014; The Greatest Commandment, posted January 11, 2015; Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the Family of God, posted January 4, 2015; Love over Law: A Principle at the Heart of Legitimacy, posted January 18, 2015; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is there a Common Word of Faith for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? posted January 25, 2015; Is Religion Good or Evil? posted February 15, 2015; A Fundamental Problem with Religion, posted May 3, 2015; and Christians Meet Muslims Today, posted June 21, 2015. 

In The Battle for God: A History of Fundamentalism (Random House, NY, 2001), Karen Armstrong has described the nature and origin of fundamentalism in Judaism, Christianity and Islam.

  

Dianna Theadora Kerry has related fundamentalism and radicalization to psychology in God, religion and fundamentalism: an unholy trinity, posted in The Conversation on July 2, 2015 at  

http://theconversation.com/god-religion-and-fundamentalism-an-unholy-trinity-42326.

For a brief description of the Wesleyan Quadrilateral by Lovett H. Weems, Jr. and a chart of its four elements by George E. Koeler, including the danger of bibliolotry, see Weems, John Wesley’s Message Today, Abingdon Press, 1990, pages 11-13.

On Our Theological Task in The Discipline of the United Methodist Church, see pages 78-91 at https://www.cokesbury.com/forms/DynamicContent.aspx?id=87&pageid=920.

Religion, Heritage and the Confederate Flag

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr., July 19, 2015

            With the lowering of the Confederate flag on the statehouse grounds in Columbia, S.C., an NAACP official opined that the flag should now be the object of moral introspection.  That may have inspired the KKK and several black activist groups to demonstrate their moral introspection of the flag on the statehouse grounds on July 18. 

 

            Just what does the Confederate flag represent—Is it hate or heritage?  A CNN poll found that 57% of Americans consider the flag a symbol of Southern pride rather than racial hatred; but racism has been endemic in the South.  Southern heritage is a mix of the good, the bad and the ugly, and the bad and ugly came to a head in the War Between the States, the Civil War, or whatever we call the terrible war that ravaged America from 1860-1865.  During that time more than 500,000 Americans lost their lives—more than in all the wars fought since then.

            The Confederate flag represents a tragedy that was as much about religion as it was about slavery, states’ rights and clashing cultures.  We need to be honest about our history and heritage.  Most Christians in the North and South were reluctant to condemn slavery as immoral since it was not condemned in the Bible, which was for them the source of God’s truth.  In How the North distorts Civil War history, Hugh Howard has noted that Abolitionists were a vocal minority, and President Lincoln was not one of them.  He pursued the Civil War in order to preserve the Union, not to abolish slavery—at least not until it was politically expedient to do so.    

            It is legitimate to ask whether Lincoln’s determination to go to war to preserve the Union was worth the cost.  About 50 years later another President, Woodrow Wilson, advocated self-determination, which was the motivation for secession, as an inalienable right of all people; and later in the 20^th century Americans applauded the dissolution of the Soviet Union.  It seemed that political unions were no longer sacred.  If Texas or California sought to secede from the Union today, would the remaining states go to war to prevent it?    

            The vast majority of Confederate soldiers were small farmers without slaves whose social, economic and political interests conflicted with the aristocratic slaveholders.  They were on the verge of their own civil war until the ”fire-eating” aristocrats convinced the dirt-farmers that if they did not join them in seceding from the Union and fighting the North that the slaves—who represented a majority in S.C.—would be emancipated, assume political power and destroy their livelihoods.  So the dirt-farmers went to war for self-preservation, and ironically, to preserve the institution of slavery and the wealth of their adversary slaveholders.

            The belief in white supremacy did not end with slavery and continued to plague politics and religion in the South well after the Civil War.  It spawned the KKK and other white supremacy groups that supported a racist Jim Crow culture; and until the civil rights movement of the mid-twentieth century most churches did not condemn white supremacy and quietly supported a separate but equal culture.  But there is no Biblical precedent for white supremacy, only the naming of the Semitic Jews as God’s “chosen people;” and Jesus was a Semite, not a Caucasian with blue eyes as he is depicted on many church walls.

            The idea that God favored Semitic Jews over whites may have played a role in the anti-Semitism of the 20^th century, especially in Germany, where Jews tended to live in urban ghettos and were not well assimilated with the rest of the Christian population.  Nazism was a secular religion based on white (Aryan) supremacy that could not be reconciled with the idea that Jews were the chosen people of God, and that undoubtedly contributed to the anti-Semitism that led to the hatred and violence directed by Nazis against Jews, which was similar to the hatred and violence directed by the KKK against blacks in the Jim Crow South.      

            There are similarities between the Antebellum South and the Jewish state of Israel today, and it is complicated by religious animosity.  Because Israel is a democracy, Palestinians, who are Muslims, are seen as a threat to Jewish political control of Israel, much as white southerners feared freed blacks in the Ante-Bellum South.  The Palestinians have a higher birth rate than Jews and are destined to outnumber Jews in Israel if they do not have their own state.  That makes the Palestinian threat to Israel as demographic as it is military.

            Culture shapes religion, just as religion shapes culture.  The violent conflict between the ideals and aspirations of radical Islam and those of libertarian democracy can be considered a culture clash.  And while slavery is not a factor in that current culture clash, it is similar to the Antebellum culture clash between the Jeffersonian ideals of an agrarian democracy and the ideals of an industrial North that was just beginning to understand its destiny.

  

            Religion, politics and race have often made strange—even uncomfortable and sometimes violent—bedfellows.  As students of history, all Americans should consider the Confederate flag as an object of moral introspection.  As for all the nation’s problems that are so often blamed on a degenerate South, It’s not Dixie’s fault.  The South has produced its share of hate, but it has also produced a culture known for its gentility and grace.  Southern religions continue to reflect those disparate qualities, from fundamentalist snake handlers and those who condemn unbelievers to hell, to progressives, both black and white, who focus their faith on reconciling their differences on religion and race through the forgiving love and mercy of God.

Notes and References to Resources:

The CNN poll found that 72% of blacks saw the Confederate flag as racist, while just 25% of whites agreed; of Southern whites 75% saw the flag as a symbol of pride while 18% saw it as racist.  See http://www.cnn.com/2015/07/02/politics/confederate-flag-poll-racism-southern-pride/.

On How the North distorts Civil War history, see http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-north-misremembered/2015/07/10/2def245e-2667-11e5-aae2-6c4f59b050aa_story.html?wpisrc=nl_opinions&wpmm=1.

On It’s not Dixie’s fault, see  http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/its-not-dixies-fault/2015/07/17/7bf77a2e-2bd6-11e5-bd33-395c05608059_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1.

Reconciliation in Race and Religion: The Need for Compatibility, not Conformity

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Last week’s blog concluded with the observation that Sunday morning is the most segregated time of the week—but is that such a bad thing?  Should traditional black churches be expected to conform their unique worship services to a common norm in order to achieve racial reconciliation?  And what about religious differences between Jews, Christians and Muslims? 

            The purpose of reconciliation in matters of race and religion is to achieve compatibility, not conformity.  The diversity, or pluralism, of races and religions has given the U.S. its strength.  It requires the assimilation of different races and religions in a common culture, but not their conformity.  The only mandatory standard of conformity in the U.S. is its rule of law.

            But some racial and religious differences require reconciliation based on a standard of legitimacy beyond that of the law, and that standard is love for one another.  Racism and religious fundamentalism have long plagued our nation and the world with hatred and violence; but after the horrific racist violence at Emanuel AME church on June 17 it was love, not law, that reconciled grieving black and white folks in Charleston, for all the world to see.      

            That demonstration of forgiveness and reconciling love overcame racial and religious differences that have traditionally segregated black and white Christians.  Those differences reflect a so-called “separate but equal” culture forced upon blacks in the Jim Crow South that did not change until the civil rights advances of the mid-twentieth century culminated in the Civil Rights Act of 1964.  Most blacks now share middle class cultural values with whites, but there remains a black subculture with divergent values, primarily in urban areas, that remains a source of racial unrest.

            The black church has traditionally been the central social and political institution of the black community and has never conformed to an integrated model of the church.  For this reason, few mainline Protestant churches have integrated congregations, and that is reflected in the United Methodist Church (UMC), which is not as united as its name implies.  Most UMC churches are predominately black or white, with integration at conference administrative levels.  In their church activities and worship, black United Methodists seem more like their African Methodist Episcopal (AME) kin than like those whites in their own UMC denomination; but even with their differences, black and white United Methodists are congenial and compatible.   

            Civil rights laws provided the secular standard of legitimacy needed to eliminate racial discrimination, but it was God’s forgiveness and love that has enabled black and white Christians to experience true reconciliation.  A similar common word of faith is needed to reconcile religious differences among Jews, Christians and Muslims, and that common word is the greatest commandment to love God and one’s neighbor as oneself, including one’s unbelieving neighbors as taught by Jesus in the story of the good Samaritan (Luke 10:25-37). 

            The main obstacle to religious reconciliation is the belief of religious fundamentalists or exclusivists that theirs is the one true faith and that God condemns all unbelievers to hell.  At their worst, radical Islamist fundamentalists like those in ISIS, al-Qaeda, Boko Haram and el-Shabab consider it a matter of faith to dispatch unbelievers to hell.

            As with race, religious diversity can enrich a culture unless it becomes so divisive as to motivate fear, hatred and violence.  Both the Hebrew Bible and the Qur’an provide examples of divine sanction for violence, and despots have used those precedents to justify violence not only in religious fundamentalism, but also in racism, Fascism, Communism and Nazism. 

            Traditionalism might be included as an “ism.  Like religious fundamentalism, it can motivate zealotry to preserve traditions that block progressive change.  That was evident in the dispute over the Confederate battle flag, which was characterized as a conflict between hate and heritage.  Fortunately reason and compassion carried the day with a spirit of reconciliation exemplified by Governor Haley and most S.C. legislators.  The flag flap was a reminder of the racial division that has plagued the South for many years; and while racial reconciliation has come slowly, most blacks are now assimilated in a pluralistic culture based on shared values.  There is no race war in America, despite the horrific efforts of Dylann Roof to create one.

            Progress toward religious reconciliation is less certain.  While most Muslims in the U.S. share our libertarian values, many are offended by the hedonism and excesses of freedom of a libertarian culture and favor fundamentalist Islamic laws (shari’a) that prohibit individual freedom.  The reconciliation of differences in religion and politics requires a political climate of libertarian democracy and human rights that begin with the freedoms of religion and speech; and those freedoms cannot exist under shari'a, with its oppressive apostasy and blasphemy laws.

            Reconciliation in matters of race and religion is ultimately a matter of the heart, and that requires the transforming power of God’s love and mercy to first reconcile people with God and then with their neighbors.  God’s spiritual power enables us to love all people as our neighbors, regardless of their race, sex, religion or sexual preference, and to accept those of other religions as our spiritual brothers and sisters in the family of God.   But a word of caution to those seeking God’s spiritual power.  Satan does a convincing imitation of God, and does some of his best impersonations in the synagogue, church and mosque.  The way to tell the difference is that God seeks to reconcile and redeem us through love, while Satan seeks to divide and conquer us through fear.  Remember that God is love, and there is no fear in love. (1 John 4:16-21)       

              

Notes and References to Resources:

For related blogs, see the following at Blog/Archives:  The greatest commandment, posted January 11, 2015;  Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith and Politics for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? posted January 25, 2015; Religion and Human Rights, posted February 22, 2015;  Promoting Religion Through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness? posted February 8, 2015; Is Religion Good or Evil? posted February 15, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, posted June 21, 2015; Confronting the Evil Among Us, posted June 28, 2015; and Racism, Religious Exclusivism and Reconciliation, posted July 5, 2015.  

       

The cultural and religious diversity of the black church in America is described by E.J. Dionne, Jr., in Liberated by grace, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-african-american-church-as-religious-oasis/2015/07/05/98c7b834-2114-11e5-84d5-eb37ee8eaa61_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1.

Marc Thiessen described “stupid” attitudes tying racism to the Confederate flag after Dylann Roof used that flag to justify his atrocity in Charleston in There’s no race war in America, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/theres-no-race-war-in-america/2015/07/06/c91c19fe-23d9-11e5-b72c-2b7d516e1e0e_story.html?wpisrc=nl_opinions&wpmm=1.

On increasing tensions between Muslims and law enforcement agencies in England over how to counter the draw of Islamist radicalism, see http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/ten-years-after-77-bombings-britain-is-split-over-how-to-fight-extremism/2015/07/03/4d0bbf66-19e5-11e5-bed8-1093ee58dad0_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1.

In Ethnic America, Thomas Sowell explained the correlation between the effective integration and wellbeing of minority groups in America with their willingness to take advantage of the opportunities for education and employment and assimilate into a pluralistic American culture.

The ban in Deuteronomy 20:16-18 and its application by Joshua at Jericho (Joshua 6:20-27) are precedents for ethnic cleansing; and the sword verses in the Qur’an call for slaying the infidel unbelievers and are often cited by radical Islamists (9:5; 9:29).  See these and other verses that justify violence in the name of God in the J&M Book at pages 585-592 (Mosaic Law) and at pages 498-502 (Islamic Law).

  

Reconciliation as a Remedy for Racism and Religious Exclusivism

 By Rudy Barnes, Jr.

            Last week we looked at what racism and religious exclusivism have in common: They both divide us and are opposed to God’s will to reconcile us.  Both God’s will and secular reason urge us to be reconciled.  Jesus prayed for a unity of all believers, and we celebrate our national political unity and equality under the law on July 4.  Whether we consider religion or reason to be the motivating force for reconciliation, it is a fundamental principle of legitimacy that all people are equal under God and the law, no matter how unequal they might otherwise be.

           

            White racism is motivated by the belief that God ordained the white race as superior to all others.  The Southern Poverty Law Center considers the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) a white supremacist group, and reports that the CCC “oppose[s] all efforts to mix the races of mankind,” and that "God is the author of racism. God is the One who divided mankind into different types. ...Mixing the races is rebelliousness against God."  Those white supremacist views were echoed in the manifesto of Dylann Roof to justify his massacre of nine people at Emanuel AME Church in Charleston, S.C. on June 17, 2015.

            A spokesman for the CCC has denied any affiliation with Roof, who appears to have been a lone-wolf terrorist who was probably motivated more by a demented and narcissistic desire to bring attention to himself than to promote the cause of white supremacy.  Whatever his motivation, the tragic episode illustrated the analogous relationship between the hatred of racism and religious exclusivism; and while racism may not be as likely to produce deadly acts of terrorism as religious extremism, both are instruments of evil that originate with fear and suspicion that can grow into hate and violence.

            Religious exclusivism promotes the supremacy of one religion over others and condemns all unbelievers, and fundamentalists assert the supremacy of holy law over secular law, denying fundamental freedoms.  The evils of religious exclusivism can be countered with a belief in the transforming power of God’s love to reconcile people of competing religions into a universal family of God.  The first step toward reconciliation is finding common ground; and for Jews, Christians and Muslims it is a common word of faith in the greatest commandment to love God and our neighbors, with our neighbors including those of other religions.  That same principle applies to racism as a form of belief based on a distorted understanding of God’s will.

            Finding common political and social values is necessary to reconcile the religious and racial differences that divide us.  Religions in libertarian democracies have conformed their doctrines to modern economic and political values that support free enterprise and libertarian democracy, even though they were not mentioned in the ancient scriptures.  That has not happened in the tribal cultures of Islam, where strict adherence to Islamic law (shari’a), with its apostasy and blasphemy laws, has precluded the freedoms of religion and speech.  Many devout Muslims are offended by the materialistic and hedonistic excesses of Western libertarian culture, and believe that a theocratic Islamist culture is superior to that of a libertarian democracy.

            In Islam no distinction is made between the sacred and the secular (religion and politics), while in libertarian democracies governments are prohibited from favoring or promoting any religion.  The reconciliation of religious and political differences in the modern world requires the acceptance of the freedoms of religion and speech, but many devout Muslims accept apostasy and blasphemy laws that prevent those freedoms in order to constrain immoral behavior.

            Those whose power or status is based on racial division or religious exclusivism oppose change.  White supremacists excluded blacks from political power in the Jim Crow South until the civil rights revolution in the 1960s enabled black leaders to gain political power by emphasizing black solidarity in gerrymandered single-member districts that elected black representatives.  But concentrating black voters in single-member districts has produced more predominately white districts with white representatives who have little concern for black interests.  That has institutionalized racial polarization at local, state and national levels, with politicians now more interested in maintaining their polarized racial constituencies than in promoting racial unity.

            The continuation of traditional black educational and social institutions that emphasize their racial identity also contributes to racial polarization, but black leaders resist integrating traditionally black institutions for the same reason that religious leaders resist abandoning the exclusivity of their traditional religious doctrines.  They have a vested interest in maintaining the status quo of racial division and religious exclusivity and see change as a threat to their status.

            Reconciliation is the remedy for racism and religious exclusivity, and it requires finding common values while respecting important cultural and religious differences.  In the political realm that requires sharing a sense of political unity and providing equal justice under law.  In the spiritual realm it requires a colorblind belief in the unity of all believers and a spiritual kinship in a family of God.  Jews, Muslims and Christians can find a common word of faith in the greatest commandment to love God and their neighbor as themselves; but while most blacks and whites share similar Christian beliefs, Sunday morning remains the most segregated hour of the week.      

Notes and References to Resources:

For related blogs, see the following at Blog/Archives: Religion and New Beginnings: Salvation and Reconciliation into the family of God, posted January 4, 2014; Jesus Meets Muhammad: Is There a Common Word of Faith and Politics for Jews, Christians and Muslims Today? posted January 25, 2015; Promoting Religion Through Evangelism: Bringing Light or Darkness? posted February 8, 2015; Is Religion Good or Evil? posted February 15, 2015; Christians Meet Muslims Today, posted June 21, 2015; and Confronting the Evil Among Us, posted June 28, 2015.   

The Southern Poverty Law Center considers the Council of Conservative Citizens (CCC) a hate group and a modern reincarnation of the old White Citizens Councils that were formed in the 1950s and 1960s to battle school desegregation in the South.  The group's newspaper, Citizens Informer, regularly publishes articles condemning "race mixing" as elaborated above.  See http://www.splcenter.org/get-informed/intelligence-files/groups/council-of-conservative-citizens.  Eugene Robinson referred to the CCC in his commentary on racism in The Washington Post, June 22, 2015, at http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/the-roots-of-racism/2015/06/22/24e61d56-1909-11e5-bd7f-4611a60dd8e5_story.html?wpisrc=nl_headlines&wpmm=1.