Reaction paper analysis and reflection

¶ … Religion: Christopher Hitchens

I was very familiar with Christopher Hitchens' position before watching his video. However, even though I was aware of his position, I had not really considered the depth and breadth of religion's involvement in modern conflicts in the world. While he said that he would avoid a Sesame Street response, but then stuck with the letter "B" and was able to name so many different conflicts that are directly traceable to people's religious affiliation came as something of a surprise to me. I simply had not considered that so many of today's modern conflicts were traceable to religion. Moreover, I am somewhat embarrassed to acknowledge that I was viewing religious conflicts as primarily disagreement between members of different religions and not even giving real consideration to the significant within-religious groups' conflicts that exist. For example, I was unaware that in Iraq people were destroying mosques that were of a different version of Islam than their own. In fact, I do not recall having heard this information at any other time, which made me reflect upon his statement that the media may discuss group-conflicts but does so in a way emphasizing ethnic differences and avoiding religious references when possible. I had not considered the media interpretations of these conflicts, and it made me think about how I might reframe some of the major "ethnic" conflicts of modern times if I had an understanding of the underlying religious issues.

The video triggered a significant amount of sorrow in me. So many people believe that religion is critical to someone being a good person. In America saying, "He is a Christian" is somehow supposed to be synonymous with "He is a good person." Likewise, mentioning that someone practices another religion immediately makes him suspect, particularly if that religion is one that is not well understood by the majority of Americans. However, the reality is that no religion has a monopoly on goodness and no religion has a monopoly on evil. People of all religious orientations do horrible things and wonderful things. Of course, he did not address any of the wonderful things people do in the name of religion, and I do wonder about that. Is the thought that people would do wonderful things anyway, even if they did not have a religious orientation motivating them to do those things? Is the thought that the wonderful things done in the name of religion are dwarfed by the awful things done in the name of religion? Honestly, I do not know the answer to that one. I believe that one's choice of religion is not really as much of a choice as people suppose; it has largely to do with where and when a person was born. However, how one interprets religion may be largely impacted by choice. For example, looking at a single issue that has challenged the modern Christian community, homosexuality, one sees Christians running the gamut from openly embracing gay members and sanctifying their unions to the Westboro Baptist Church's hateful and violent rhetoric against gays, and Christians all along that spectrum frequently claim that their religion dictates their feelings towards homosexuals. It certainly seems to me that this approach is similar in any controversial area; regardless of one's stated religious preference, the individual is going to twist religious mandates to meet their personal beliefs.