One of the reasons I decided to take the Religious Studies course at Western was to learn more about other religions.  I felt I had a pretty good handle on Christianity, but I knew little about Judaism and almost nothing about Islam.  I had been exposed to a smattering of Buddhism and The Dao, but nothing of Hinduism.  I saw great gaps in my background that left me feeling like my foundation of belief was “built on sand.”  As I come toward the end of my  third semester, I still feel like I’m on shaky ground at times.  I am currently well into my fifth class and I am realizing I’ve barely scratched the surface.

A second reason for this endeavor is to find links between the major religions of the world.  I firmly believe that there is A God.  Only one, not a different one for each religion.  Only One, who has been given different names in different languages and is seen from various viewpoints, but still is the same being.  I hope to find substantiation for this opinion in my studies.  Some of what I’ve learned about Islam backs up that opinion and has been useful to my quest.

One thing is the injunction to stay mindful of God.  Muslims pray five times a day to remind them to always be mindful of God.  As a Christian, Lent is my mindful time.  I’m not saying that I only practice my faith at this time of year, but it is during Lent that I make a commitment to do, or not do, something that will remind me every day of Jesus’ sacrifice.  Traditionally, this meant giving up some form of food or drink and I still do that.  This year, I am eliminating potatoes from my menus.  Sometimes, it’s easy.  Just filling my plate at dinner without them.  At other times, I must restrain myself from grabbing, just one, french fry from someone else’s fast food meal.  In either case, it is a reminder that I am only asked to make small sacrifices for my faith, not the ultimate sacrifice that Jesus made.

A less traditional commitment is to make a promise to do something.  What thing isn’t as important as the reason for doing it.  It’s just another, more positive, way to stay mindful on our road to Easter.  The commitment “to do” is more difficult for me that the don’t.  I am reminded of the don’t every time I plan a meal.  Remembering the “to do” takes more effort.  We are on the fourth week of Lent.  Every day, I consider the fact that I did not make a real “to do” promise this year.  I thought about several possibilities and dismissed them.  So, my Lenten “to do” has been meditating on Lent.  What it means and why we celebrate it.  I am in belief mode, not action.

In the past, I’ve tried several “practices.”  Reading scripture everyday, praying at a certain time every day, dedicating more time to service, but none of those seemed fitting this year.  This year, I feel more like a Buddhist.  I search within for meaning.  I listen for that “still small voice.”  This year, I reach for God, not somewhere in the “great beyond,” but inside my own heart and mind.

The weather hasn’t been encouraging enough to tempt me to sit under a tree all day as Gautama did on his search for enlightenment.  Just finding a few quiet moments in the nursery school I currently inhabit is a challenge all by itself.  I must admit, that there have been days when I failed.  On those days, I tell myself that I am only human and begin again.

Easter is almost upon us.  It comes, bringing hope and the promise of God’s blessings on us.  I am not sure that Jesus’ death was payment for our sins.  I am afraid we still pay for those ourselves.  But I do think He died to bring us a message of Hope and Forgiveness.  The scripture that says “God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whoever believes in Him shall not perish, but have eternal life,” (NAS Bible. John 3:16)  Jesus came knowing He would die for His teachings.  He made that sacrifice so that we could know His message of love and hope.  It is our responsibility to pass it along.

My oldest daughter said to me one day a week or so ago, “You know how you reach a point that you think you are pretty well educated?  Then you find out just how ignorant you really are?”  We had both suffered that particular realization that day, on different subjects.  It is a really stunningly humbling experience.  We cruise along, taking classes, reading books, just living.  Then we run against something that should really be common knowledge, but we had never been exposed to it.

The hole in my own education holds all the “dark ages” of Europe and “The Crusades.”  Somehow, I have missed taking any courses related to medieval history.  In various Literature classes, I had read bits and pieces from the time frame, but nothing that gave me a real understanding nor even a basic knowledge.

I discovered this philistinism while reading Jerusalem: One City, Three Faiths by Karen Armstrong.  It is the text being used for my class on Middle Eastern Religions.  The first section was about Judaism and I felt comfortable with most of it.  I won’t claim to be an Old Testament expert, but I have read most of it.  The begats zone me out fairly quickly, but I have a working knowledge.  The second section on early Christianity was disturbing, not because I didn’t know it, but because I’d never looked at it from the outside before.  Some of it isn’t very uplifting.

I had been waiting all semester to get to Islam.  A desire to learn more about this religion that has become such a dominant force in today’s world was the main reason I had enrolled in the class.  I have had Muslim acquaintances and read other books about modern Islam.  I had heard and seen bits and pieces of information in movies and on television, some true, some fictional.  But, I knew little of Islamic history and I didn’t feel I had even a minimal knowledge of what it was.  From things I had read and seen, I had come to the conclusion on my own that ‘Allah’ was simply their word for God just as the Spanish say ‘Dios’ and the French ‘Dieu.’  It frustrated me that most Americans seem to think it means a different God because they use a different word.  Is a horse a different animal because the Arabic language calls it ‘hisan?’

The chapters on Islam are covering the crusades in a way I had never been exposed to before.  I must trust Armstrong’s words.  She was accurate about all other points, although her viewpoint sometimes made me flinch.  Her book was chosen for this class at a respected university.   I could sort of understand the attitude the early Christians displayed toward the Jews.  I didn’t agree with it, but I could see why they felt as they did, especially after centuries of persecution.  Their actions during the crusades, I could not find any way to condone.  I  am not saying that modern Christians deserve to bear the brunt of the sins of the religious leaders and knights who committed those long ago atrocities , but sins they were.  I don’t know why I am so shocked.  I knew about the Inquisition  and the Salem witch trials.  I realize that the Bible has been used as justification for everything from slavery to the current attitude toward gay marriage.  I simply wasn’t prepared for the romanticized Crusades to be a coverup for the invasion of a foreign land and the all out slaughter of people who had done absolutely nothing to deserve it.

I am constantly saddened by the perversion of Jesus’ teachings.  During Lent, my commitment was to attend a special Sunday School class about the Cross & the Resurrection.  It was an in depth look at what those two things mean to us.  I came away wondering why we needed to define them at all.  To my way of thinking, they are simple facts.  Jesus was executed by the method commonly in use at that place and time.  On the morning of the third day, the tomb was empty.  He appeared, alive, to his disciples and other people several times over the next few weeks.  Then He ascended. I don’t need to understand God’s motives for what happened.

Why do we need to dissect it?  Instead we should be concentrating on the real reason He came, to deliver His message.  We should be dissecting His teachings.  That is what’s important about Him, not how or why he died.  In the long run, it doesn’t matter if He gave his life as “payment” for our sins or as an “atonement” to bring us closer to God.  All that matters is “Do Unto Others as You Would Have Them Do to You.”  We simply don’t seem to get it.  I can only take small comfort in knowing that things have improved.  The scorched earth policy of centuries past is deplored today and people who engage in it are called war criminals.  The “more civilized” countries, including those who engaged in the Crusades, try to contain the perpetrators.  Still, we have a long way to go.

In some of my reading this past month, and I can’t remember the source, I came across a concept of heaven that was new to me.  I like it, but I am afraid it means postponing the end of the world for another 2000 years. The gist of it is this:  Jesus’ kingdom isn’t something that will arrive intact.  Mankind is supposed to be building it here on earth.  We are supposed to be learning to live by His teachings, to be making a worldwide kingdom of peace and love where everyone will do what is right because they want to, not to keep from being punished.  When we finally achieve that goal, He will return and rule for all eternity.  Are you ready to build?  Do you think anyone else is trying?