Ignorant faith - religion

I have written about faith before in this blog but I feel I should readdress this issue.

I do believe faith is important in society. There are things you need to believe in despite there being no evidence or logic to the argument. We, as a collective species, cannot always rationalize everything into a simple statement. Yet you cannot always have 100% blind faith. Most of the time you need a heavy big dose of reality or logic. In my opinion there are three situations were faith can be misguided: faith in God (religion), faith in your country (patriotism) and faith in your sports team (sports fanaticism).

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I could write volumes of books about the misguided faith which comes about from religion but I will try to keep my opinions short and brief. I admit I'm not a very good Anglican. I haven't been to church for a long time and I do not study the Bible. However I live my life in regards to Christian teaching. That is what I believe. Yet I know there are flaws in the Christian teaching, especially regarding homosexuality and abortion. I don't believe homosexuality is a sin. Gay and lesbian couples should be allowed a civil partnership to have the same human rights as heterosexual couples. I personally believe in abortion as every life is sacred. Yet I champion the right for a mother to choose whether or not she should have an abortion. It is not my place to impose my belief on other people. The law and religion should be separate, despite what others say and believe.

Yet there are people who use the Bible as a rule book and not guidelines as they should. They live their lives strictly by the word of God. They still abhor the sins of homosexuality and abortion. Yet they choose to ignore other "rules" in the Bible. I know a number of Christians who still eat seafood and pork (Leviticus 11:9-12). A lot of doctors I know are Christian and yet they work on the day of the Sabbath (Exodus 35:2). These are the same people who think everybody should live by the Bible and points to the increase in family disharmony and decrease in social values as evidence for this. What they fail to see is that many families with atheist or other religious beliefs don't have family or social problems. What these Christian think is that there religion is better than others, which isn't the case or the issue. I believe in Christianity because I believe in God, not that He is better than Allah or the Buddha. I have maximum respect for Islam, Judaism and other religions. I am forever grateful to Mrs Sarchet-Waller, my religious education teacher in Shatin College who gave me a proper education of all the major faiths in the world.

Perhaps that what separates me from these people, the lack of ignorance. I know there are other religions in the world and they have their merits as well. At times I think followers of other religions are more faithful to their religion than Christians are. I also know there are many people who don't believe in religion and not all social arguments can be dealt with by religion alone, such as abortion, euthanasia, the death penalty and suicide. I also know that I cannot impose my religious belief on other people. Like I stated before I do not believe in abortion but I do think there should be a law allowing women to choose whether or not they want an abortion.