Today, a group of friends and I were discussing the amount of discrimination that is represent in our society today. Groups of people facing discrimination are due to their marital status, their sexual orientation, and their race, to name a few things. Discrimination occurs in all places around the world, some being feasible than others. Sure, people are discriminated in the workplace at the time. (I am not by any means condoning this, but people are able to accept this a little more than discrimination in other places. Just hear me out before bashing my ideas!) However, a horrible place where people are discriminated all the time is their own religious sects.
Religion is used by people to find themselves and be able to develop their connection with a higher power. Religion is a very intimate thing for everyone, and the idea that people are persecuted in their religious sects is just unfathomable to me. A person should be able to be themselves in their religious sects, and not have to hid in fear of persecution. It's true that mostly orthodox religious are more strict about these things, but the issue still exists. Why are divorced women and people from the LGBT community discriminated in the Catholic Church?
The idea of religions persecuting people because of different things in their lives in completely horrible. To me, these persecutions against groups of people contradicts the essences of what religion is and the motives it has!
I really like your post. It reminds me of a story when a woman had converted to Mormonism and even though she believed what everyone else believed and followed all the doctrines, many of the other Mormons looked down on her because she was a 'convert' and not a Mormon follower from birth. It's one thing to be looked down upon from outside groups...but this woman was part of this religion and was still considered an outsider.
ReplyDeleteThis is a great post -- discrimination is way to strong of a concept even in situations where people should be free to speak their mind without fear. Even in a place like religion where there are so many individual difference that can be brought out, still so many people hide their true feelings so as not to be looked down upon
ReplyDeleteGreat post, I totally agree. In fact, my own free post this week is about religious double standards, so I definitely share your sentiments. Religion is supposed to make you feel safe, not ostracized and targeted.
ReplyDeleteI agree. I know that this happened personally to someone I knew. They were a devout Mormon and as soon as some unknown facts became know they were discriminated and called out. It completely changed their view on their religion. I think it has two effects, one they are shunned away and they don't want to come back. And two, they are so upset by this that they try and form a portion of their religion that they are able to be involved in. Ex: GLBT Mormons.
ReplyDeleteI also agree. I also wonder how, today, the Catholic church can be so rigid about women and LGBT people. It's amazing to me that it is such a powerful religion when it is so discriminatory.
ReplyDeleteWe certainly are in a period of unparalleled struggles for unity. But it's not the same thing as saying that religion fits us the way we are. God asks us to grow and leave what we were behind. Cultures around the world are diverse and some have x features and others have y features. Some will consequently find a teaching easier to adopt and z teaching harder. Not everything we think we are is who we are and in the process of religion we discover it. All choices are not equal even if we will also strip back many we thought were also real.
ReplyDeleteIt always amazes me how much discrimmination there is in the world, one would think that religion, since it attempts to provide a safe-haven from the world, would be more accepting, but I know that discrimmination is quite prevalent.
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