Christianity

How to Fuck up Your Kids Using Religion as a Tool

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Do you have a hatred inside you that you wish to transfer to your children? Do you channel the hatred by religion? Is hate more important to you than children feeling safe and loved? This piece is for You.

Dear Hater,

This is how You should roll it.

Speak directly the kids that You want to transfer the hate to – Your kids, Your grandkids, other kids that You are taking care of or have an influence over, kids that are dependant on You and Your care in order to feel safe and secure, and therefore have no other or little other reference they can relate to, no other safety net, no other strong role models that they can rely on instead, when You start your hateful indoctrination.

Tell the kids that there is A Certain Religion that is bad, simply bad with no specific reason. Tell the kids that whoever belongs to That Religion is dirty, unclean, unfaithful, greedy, cheap. Any negative adjective You can use – use it for That Certain Religion.

Use a stereotype for anyone coming from That Certain Religion. Tell the children about the certain features of that religion. These people have certain hair colours, noses, facial features. That’s how you can tell they belong to That Religion.

The people from That Religion is all bad. Everything they do, they’re bad. You can never be friends with them. You can never go to school with them. You can never be neighbours with them. You can never work with them. This, the children needs to know. Before they start school, they need to know. They can never accept other people as individuals. Everything should be filtered in the dirty filter that You use for life.

Does anyone in the children’s extended family belong  to That Religion? Did they, God forbid, marry an outcast who belongs to That Religion? Did someone make the unforgivable crime of converting? Tell the children that all these people that have committed that unforgivable sin will be punished for what they did. Family or not, religion cuts through everything. They don’t celebrate the same religious occasions as You and the children do, and therefore, they are bad. They will never be able to enter certain religious places because of their religion. Even when life is over, when they’re dead, they won’t find peace. They will burn in hell. Hell, to children, is scary. Use that fear as an incitement. Fear filters everything. Fear is a useful filter against love. Fear is a useful filter against happiness.

You hope that You succeed. Succeeding in passing on the hate is,  first and foremost, the ultimate goal for the children that You care for.

But wait! Somehow, with one child or more, You were not successful. The children grow up, slowly but steadily along a rocky path, and where fear had it’s way, hate somehow didn’t make it. They could not buy the concept of hate, but they could not resist the concept of fear. Confusion and anxiety took the place where You hoped hatred would be.

You did not succeed. The children are not haters the way You hoped. But they are not secure, happy, grown up persons. Any hateful comments, they flinch and dodge. Any hateful comment, they might attack. Any hateful comment, it hurts them as if a bullet went straight to their heart.

You have made everything poisoned. Any religious holiday, any family gathering, it’s all attached to the fear and confusion, to the hatred You hoped would be planted in their heart.

You have succeeded, but You have not succeeded. You have created a damaged, fearful person where You hoped hatred would have been a part of the child, now the grown up person’s, spine. The hate have stopped, but the pain hasn’t. The pain probably never will. You have succeeded, but You have not succeeded. Where You wanted a strong hate to take place, something else took it’s place.

In the worst case for You, the grown up child recent everything that You were standing for. The grown up child might recent You and Your ways, even long after You have left this life. But the grown up child is still not happy. Still not secure. They are just fucked up. But they won’t carry on Your hate. This means, You have really not succeeded at all.

Regards,

Someone who’s not carrying on with Your hate

Happy Easter from Iraq

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Happy Easter everyone! These photos is from this weekend’s Easter celebration in Virgin Mary church in central Baghdad, Iraq. The photos are shared by Beautiful Iraq team, originally from Getty Images.

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Non-Religious Doesn’t Mean Open-minded, Religious Doesn’t Mean Close-minded. Got It?

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There’s so much talk of religions nowadays and many, especially in the West, seem to presume that being religious automatically makes you close-minded, while being non-religious automatically makes you open-minded. Even if being faithful to a religion usually comes with a pattern that you will want to follow (sometimes not, though), this doesn’t necessarily make the faithful person close-minded and unwilling to accept other people’s lifestyles. And even if a person claims not to be religious, this doesn’t make him or her an open-minded, liberal person.

We are in an international fragile situation right now where some automatically make a connection between religion and closed minds. I believe this is a dangerous road to take, so I wanna straighten some things out. Ready?

Drinking alcohol doesn’t automatically make you liberal.

Sleeping around before marriage doesn’t automatically make you liberal.

Moving to a Western country doesn’t automatically make you liberal.

Having a mixed circle of friends doesn’t automatically make you liberal.

Claiming you don’t want to hang out with people from your country of origin, to score points with white people, does absolutely not make you liberal.

Close-minded, or can we call it hypocrite?, is the man claiming to be liberal, but who makes a girl he got pregnant have an abortion since he can’t tell his family he had a child outside marriage. Or if she still keeps it, he never tells his family he fathered a child, tucks the child away as a secret. I have met many of these men and girls who have had a baby by these men, it’s not a nice experience.

Open-minded is the religious woman who doesn’t condemn her girlfriends when their life choices dramatically differ from hers. I have met many such women who were believers and who weren’t bothered by my lifestyle (important note: I also wasn’t bothered by theirs). It has always been a great experience. A religious Swedish-Egyptian girl who has a special place in my heart, has been supportive of me in some difficult situations, always without being judgemental, despite our sometimes very different values. Another close friend is hajja (she has made the pilgrim trip to Mecca), and she has often been the first one I reach out to for advice.

People don’t impress me when they claim not to be religious. People impress me when they have non-judgemental, egalitarian values and stick with them, stay honest with who they are. Some of our values might always clash, but there can still be mutual respect and friendship. I’ve had this proved many times.

Forget about people having to be close-minded since they’re openly religious. Forget about people being open-minded since they claim not to be religious, or play down the role of religion. If we want to tackle the challenges of extremism and alienation between groups, we have to widen our gaze and see people’s actions and acceptance for other people. That is what really tells us who a person is. That, rather than the label of a religion.