What Is Too Much Or Too Little Religion?

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What Is Too Much Or Too Little Religion?

By John Dale Eyler
Dec. 25, 2004

One need only look to the Mideast to see the result of too much religion. Okay, lets be fair, not religion necessarily, but zealotry undeniably. Too little religion gives us Communist style despotism and that's not proven to be such a picnic either. At the extremes in the U.S. are those who take their religious faith so seriously as to try to impose it on the rest of us. At the other end of the spectrum are those who try to push a ridiculously zealous brand of secularism upon us. Most of us land in the middle of this. The problem with the middle is that it is nearly undefinable.

Because the middle ground is undefinable we are going to have to listen to the arguments on this stuff till pretty much the end of time. That's an indescribably boring notion. The arguments never really change, sometimes the details have a different twist but what are we going to do, define the indefinable?

This time of year brings the argument to the fore as the secularists work to ban all things Christmas. I can't think of a more obnoxious pursuit. I'm not a Christian but how can one not find and enjoy the spirit of the Christmas holiday? Can we not all embrace the positive without trying to flesh out some rotten core to everything.

When I look at the history of religion it's been both a positive and negative force. When zealotry arises nothing is more dangerous than a religion, but one would be a fool not to acknowledge the positive results of religious influence. Were it not for religions influence over the years I fear we would be a dark black world today. Would there be freedom? or Charity? or the Golden Rule?

As for the secularists amongst us the history here is not as defined. Russia, China and pre-WWll Germany are our most obvious examples of a world without religious influence. These are not shining examples. Here in the U.S. secularists have had run of the Universities and the schools systems and the track record there is not so great either. I guess I would define the solution as; Religiousity or spiritualism without zealotry is a good thing. Secularism is a loud obnoxiuous thing that should be viewed the same way as a religion.

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Email John Dale Eyler: john@thinkdebate.com

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