My Religion and Beliefs Are Right
And yours are wrong
My religion and beliefs are right and yours are wrong.
To give you some context, I am a Christian and would never be disrespectful to someone by saying such a thing to their face. Most of us have beliefs or values, or at the least know someone that does. They give us direction and help us to understand our place in the world and where we fit in. Our beliefs are the very thing that defines us as an individual.
That being said it is only natural that we feel very passionate about them and want others to experience, and share our spiritual journeys. However, there seems to be a trend coming through in society where people are starting to get emotionally bashed, criticized, or belittled because of what they stand for. This is what I call belief bashing.
How do people belief bash you?
This can come in many forms. The most popular and probably the most obvious is online. The unfortunate thing here is that there is no emotion in text form unless you are very deliberate in how you write your post. This can lead people to misinterpret what someone is asking or what is been said.
Have you ever tried putting a post about God on a community Facebook group? It's savage. People will sit behind their security settings all nice and safe and dish out insults, putdowns, and go to extreme lengths to belittle you for what you believe in. This can make you feel angry, hurt, and alone.
How to know if someone is belief bashing you online
There are many ways that a person can bash you online for your beliefs. Let’s start with a few examples to analyze the tones. Because I am a Christian, I will give examples based on this because I follow no other faith or spiritual belief.
1. I am not sure why people believe in this, but each to their own.
This is a slap-it-away comment. The person has started the post off with an insult to the person’s beliefs and ended with the sentiment (each to their own) to try and crawl their way out of the insult.
2. How do you believe in something you can’t see?
This could be a person who is generally seeking more answers but is most likely thinking you are an idiot.
3. Church isn’t my thing. I used to go to Sunday school as a kid.
This could possibly indicate they have had a bad experience at church or that they simply did not get good spiritual/faith role modeling at home. Or they simply decided Christianity isn’t their buzz.
4. I only go to church when it’s Easter time.
People who only go to church at Easter generally have a very loose belief in Christianity or are going along because they feel it is a sense of duty or tradition.
5. The haha emoji.
This one is pretty self-explanatory. They think you are a joke.
Other forms of belief bashing.
Real-life interactions of belief bashing are often done in more of an intermittent setting. Perhaps you are a part of a church or organization and exploring where you fit in with your beliefs. You may feel like you don't belong and are often persuaded to stay where you are. This is particularly prevalent with people who have had a long-held belief.
Fear can often be the very thing that holds most people back from buying into another religion or belief. You are often taught that the belief you follow is correct and nothing else even comes close to it. You may feel torn or scared to explore others' perspectives or viewpoints because of long-term conditioning.
The media in my opinion would have to be the biggest influence of all. We have a massive range of ways to reach people from television, radio, online, and many others. Without realizing it, we buy into the hype, get anxious and frustrated, and think because it's the media that it must be correct. But a lot of people now seem to be wising up and doing their own research.
A good example of this would be the Catholic faith. We hear about sexual abuse a lot in the news. This has and can lead to people having a negative stereotype about them and without realizing it, we tarnish the faith with that brush. The honest truth is that abuse happens in all faiths and also outside of the church by non-believers. But because people have a negative stereotype of Catholics and the church as a whole, we instantly lose perspective. By default, we follow others' opinions and think that all Catholics are child abusers.
So how do we stop belief bashing and show respect to others?
Faith and belief are important to us. We need to learn about others' viewpoints and perspectives and understand that they feel just as strongly about their beliefs as we do. We should be sensitive to that by listening with love and compassion and without being condescending.
I personally have also been guilty of this in the past. I have had conversations with friends that are into witchcraft or tarot reading for example. By all accounts, my faith tells me that I should not be hanging out with these people. But I know what my beliefs are and I am sticking to them while respecting others' differing opinions.
I am lucky enough that I enjoy learning others' perspectives while been able to stick firmly to my own faith. My friends also realize what this means to me and are respectful of that, mostly.
Final thoughts
We need to respect others by learning about their way of life with an open ear while showing compassion. There is nothing wrong with learning about others' way of life. But this leaves me with a thought that has been churning around in my head for quite some time: If most religions practice love and peace, then why are they not showing it?
