These thoughts stem from this post and it's reactions, which wasn't intended to be about whether religions oppose each other or not, it was about whether it is okay or not to have an open mind towards them.
I know that people say it's okay to have an open mind towards other religions and when reading other religious canons, but I don't believe most of them mean it. (This idea is new to me lately, that people are capable of saying things and thinking they mean them when they don't, but anyway...) It's politically correct, or religiously correct, to believe it good to have an open mind towards things other people hold to be true and dear to them, but I think that's more because the positive connotation we associate with having an "open mind" and less about what it really means, or I guess I have to say 'what it really means to me'.
I think all too often people, like me, venture into other religious ideas and texts and willingly engage in conversations with those we think differently from only after our mind is already made up, tipping our toes in the foreign water out of curiosity, out of a desire to be deemed as less ignorant. I don't think that's being open minded.
I think that when we first believe that the Bible is exclusively divine, we then sacrifice the ability to read other texts with an open mind. Listening to ideas from other religions and agreeing or disagreeing with them based on whether they agree with the Bible or not is not having an open mind.
To approach something with an open mind, we have to be willing to earnestly give every idea a fighting chance, whether it agrees with what we already believe or not. In order to approach things with an open mind our ideals must be fluid, with plenty of room for those thoughts not yet included, and the openness to discard of the thoughts already present for better ones, or different ones, or to discard just for discarding's sake, without feeling the need to replace them with new.
That said, I think most people don't have an open mind towards things, and that's alright with me.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
2 comments:
Haha when you have a cousin like me and a sister like Brooke stuff like that just happens! But thats what makes us fun!
My question to you after reading this post ( and specifically this part: "with plenty of room for those thoughts not yet included, and the openness to discard of the thoughts already present for better ones, or different ones, or to discard just for discarding's sake, without feeling the need to replace them with new.")
is this: On what basis do you make the decision that one belief is better than another? or when a belief is false and when it is true?
It is funny that you asked me to read this post because this topic of an "open mind" was actually a debate my college Bible study group had gotten into. After the debate, I felt more confused upon the topic than I had when it began, to be honest. Of course, I believe that the Bible holds all truth, but then one could wonder, doesn't everyone believe that their religion holds all truth? If you talk to someone of a different religion, they will explain that their beliefs are true. So I struggled with this concept for a while, and I have concluded for myself that it just comes down to faith in what you believe. Jesus is the way, the truth, and the light and I believe that through a relationship with Him, we are given salvation. However, what about those people who are really good people, and know that they love God, yet they don't know Jesus, either by never being taught or by not being exposed to Him? What about those people who devote their lives to serving God and serving people, and don't knw the Son? I feel that God is a loving God, and I could not see Him turning away someone from His kingdom due to lack of wisdom. Having an open mind towards other beliefs can be hard, because often times, people will want to defend what they believe and bring others into it, when really, we need to be reaching out to each other in understanding and perhaps try to find common ground between our beliefs rather than pick out the differences. I had dated a guy who was a different religion than I (he was part of the Latter-Day Saints church), and honestly, I got a really hard time for it from other Christians. It was a very difficult thing for me at first, because of course I believed my religion was correct. With the guy I dated, we had countless number of conversations on our religious controversy, but I felt that I could not correctly say anything about his church until I knew what it was about. He took me to his church before, I had looked at his scriptures before, and yes, there were differences between the religions. However, I feel that by doing this, my mind was opened because instead of sitting there and discussing the differences, we discovered the similarities, and that of both of our faiths, the primary goal is the love God and serve others through love. I still feel as though I try to keep an open mind, yet I also catch myself trying to defend my belief, when really, I should be listening and reaching out to others and showing God's love through my actions. I don't know if this is all that you meant, but it is something that I had thought about for quite sometime, and I still am unsure what exactly an open mind is. I suppose one can have an open mind, but my heart is closed upon knowing that I have faith in the Father, Son, and Holy Spirit, and no matter what I hear and take in, and agree about other religions, I know that I want to love God and others.
Post a Comment