Can your faith in a Religion be a Passport to World Peace?

“Passport” DailyPost’s Daily-Prompt for March 31, 2017

There are 313 (recognized) religions in the US.

According to some estimates, there are roughly 4,200 religions in the world today.

The word religion is sometimes used interchangeably with “faith” or “belief system”, but religion differs from private belief in that it has a public aspect. If we were to number private belief systems as religions then the estimated number would be closer to 100,000,000.

Jesus, Buddha, Mohammed, and Lao Tzu, just to name a few from an endless list of spiritual leaders, all taught LOVE as the foundation of Life, Happiness and World Peace.

The problem throughout the history of modern man, right up to today, is that the Religions that were formed around the teachings of these great people lost their leader’s ‘message of love’ through translation, misinterpretation and the worst of all human downfalls – ego.

So let’s take these 4,200 different religious beliefs in the world today, all proclaiming to believe in “the true way” of spirituality and faith. Also with absolute intolerance to anyone not believing as they do. Enough so as to go to war over that belief.

bellum sacrum (latin)

A religious war or holy war is a war primarily caused or justified by differences in religion.

A few of these from Ancient (biblical) times:

the conquest of Canaan by the Israelites in the Book of Joshua

Muslim conquests of the 7th and 8th centuries

Christian Crusades (11th to 13th centuries)

and Wars of Religion (16th and 17th centuries).

A few Religious conflict in the modern period:

Palestine and Israel

Pakistan and India

Abyssinia – Somalia

Northern – Southern Ireland

Nigerian conflict

Buddhist uprising

Chinese conflict

Lebanese Civil War

Yugoslav Wars

As a high school student during the Vietnam (conflict) War, I was taught by my history teacher that: not only has there never been more than a 7 year period of time of World Peace in the history of modern man, but, any war that lasted more than 6 years is a religious war.

My mantra since then has always been: “Religion is the root of all evil.”

So when I read this morning’s Twitter:

“We can make this a more peaceful century if we cherish non-violence and concern for others’ well-being.” -Dalai Lama

I thought about what my spiritual leader said:

“I believe in God, but not as one thing, not as an old man in the sky. I believe that what people call God is something in all of us. I believe that what Jesus and Mohammed and Buddha and all the rest said was right. It’s just that the translations have gone wrong.”