When our beliefs fail, what do we do?
Many Rwandans are leaving Catholicism for Islam. The number of Muslims has doubled since the genocide to about 15% of the population, and it is still growing. This makes psychological sense. Catholicism did not prevent the horror. In fact, some priests and nuns helped or joined the killers. No wonder that for many Rwandans now Islam is a more morally believable faith. Even if not so far away Sudans Islamic government is now pursuing genocide against its own people.
People need beliefs that transcend their sense of alienation, and bind them together into a community. But every faith has failed people somewhere.
In large measure Christianity failed Europe. The fact that Europeans have left their religions in droves while Americans have not, surely goes back to the genocides and horrors of the last century. Christianity did not save millions from pointless deaths in world wars. For the Europeans these things happened at home; for the Americans though losses were great - they were far away. Add in the assaults from science, the history of religious wars, the state-sponsored churches: religion has taken more of a beating in Europe than anywhere else.
Its hard to invent new and more convincing faiths. Easier to adopt a different version or even a rival faith than face the void of none at all, and then try to fill it with something new and untarnished.
Unlike Rwanda, in Europe a rival faith has not successfully recruited the disillusioned. Friends visiting last week from England agnostic lefties of my generation surprised me by pointing out how much more positive and helpful young Americans seemed to be than young Brits. They feel that many young people in England are in a state verging on despair. It was their suggestion, not mine, that religious belief may make young Americans more positive and hopeful.
The trouble with agnosticism and doubt is that it is hard to organize a community around it.
But not impossible.
I belong to a Unitarian Universalist congregation that includes many agnostics. We do many of the things Christians and Muslims do: we contribute to central funds to have buildings and a qualified minister; we organize committees to care for our members when they are in need, to provide what we call religious education for our children and adults, to organize social activities and pursue our values in the world outside.
At times it seems comical to me how like a believing religious organization we are. We have Sunday Services complete with music, hymns, sermons, candles. We call the hymns songs and sing non-Christian words to the old Christian tunes. We meditate in the service, and share joys and sorrows from our lives, so there are elements of Buddhism and perhaps Quakerism there.
What unites us is a set of ethical beliefs, an acceptance of doubt about matters theological, a commitment to community and to living out ethics in everyday life. Most of us think spirituality is important, but we have different ways of seeking or experiencing it. Some believe in something that might be called God and some dont.
In this congregation I feel a sense of belonging to something much bigger than myself that affirms love, recognizes suffering, resolves to act as we are able, and in no way violates my sense of what is believable about the universe. There is nothing extreme about it it is measured, kind, modest, makes few claims for itself, but stands up for its values. I think it is hard to despair in such a community.
In Iran, people are out of love with Islam. The Chinese are long out of love with Communism. Let extreme interpreters of any tradition rule, and within a generation or two their excesses create disillusion. But will the Iranians re-find or invent versions of Islam that do satisfy them? Will the Chinese find new versions of old faiths like Qigong that satisfy them?
Until recently I was afraid that the Bush team might be stupid enough to cut short the evolution of Iran by invading it to help its democrats. That would be the kiss of death to their hopes. There are no short cuts to democracy, or to finding a faith that works. It has to come from within. Help can come from outside, but the insiders have to control the movement. (Now Bush & co. are too tied up in Iraq to invade anywhere else I believe).
I am not clear what kind of cult is in charge in the White House. I only hope they can learn when their beliefs dont work. Military might is big magic, but its not big enough to create democracies where none were before, or to give people something decent to believe in. The best belief system whether the most ideal versions of Islam, Christianity, Communism or Democracy when imposed by force on a people, or when corrupted by the ambitions of rulers, will invite disillusion and contempt.
Modest goals, kindness, empathy, ethical action, ethical means. These work better than hubristic claims to truth and righteous war. May disillusion breed neither fanaticism nor despair, but new efforts to join together in kinder and more realistic faiths.
