This discussion is about individual faith, which can vary greatly in meaning from person to person. For me, when it comes to God and spirituality, faith is something that cannot easily be denied. In religious settings, people may openly discuss their faith, but unfortunately, the power dynamics of politics and the sense of belonging can be so overwhelming that for many, it overrides everything, including their faith. They may profess belief in God and spirituality, but when it comes to the politics of their groups, they can easily be influenced to commit spiritual offenses in the name of belonging.
My simple motto is that if you don’t know about something, place it in the metaphorical basket of unknowns. Interestingly, as human beings, we have some political issues related to a sense of belonging, and we dislike accepting that neither we nor our ancestors know everything. Not acknowledging that our knowledge is incomplete can not only lead us to remain ignorant but also to be proven wrong collectively. If we continue to rely on egotistical assumptions, they may eventually turn into political falsehoods and distorted truths. In the scientific realm, things must be clearly and logically explained; otherwise, there is a high chance they will be debunked. Since we as individuals and as a society are continuously evolving, none of our knowledge can remain stagnant. Individually, when we encounter something we don’t know, we can seek clarification from leaders who can address our concerns by explaining our collective accepted truths. Unfortunately, our ignorance isn’t limited to individuals; collectively, we can ignore facts because of the politics of belonging. Admitting and saying, “I don’t know,” is not as humiliating as being proven wrong collectively, so we continue to assert that our knowledge is correct. Whether it is scientifically proven wrong or not is beside the point—it’s because our ancestors said so. Now, the question arises: why do we persist in fighting egotistically, even though we have been evolving and changing throughout our history? You can fight over a piece of land, collectively, but when you fight and kill each other over who is right about matters beyond our cliff of faith, it’s all about fighting over our non-physical realities. Having differing opinions in areas of human life while we are alive may be acceptable, but killing each other over matters beyond the cliff of faith simply doesn’t make any sense, especially from a spiritual standpoint. Politically, well, that’s an entirely different ballgame of our religions. Even acknowledging that it is not spiritual should be sufficient for individuals to adopt moderate belief systems. How can religion stand by while politics of belonging override spirituality? They can twist and manipulate it to the extent that it becomes an accepted truth for their members. This is happening, and eventually, we will evolve enough to recognize the political biases in our belief systems. Individually, as a CEO, we can see it all, but speaking out against our own belief systems is another matter entirely.
If you choose to spend your life following in the footsteps left by your ancestors or preached by your Mullah, Priest, or Rabbi, go ahead, but don’t envy or become upset by those who don’t follow the path you’re on. Following in the footsteps of your ancestors has been shown to be prejudicial and discriminatory in the era of equal human rights, so continually adhering to prejudice and discrimination in today’s world doesn’t cut it.
Thinking that the meaning of prejudice and discrimination ends with racism would be oversimplifying, as it permeates deep into one’s belief system as well. Learning and feeling, under the hormonal influence, that your ancestors were right and others were wrong is actually based on the politics of belonging to your respected groups. Assuming that we are right and they are wrong with evolving knowledge would be a logical nightmare.
If you believe that right and wrong will be determined after you die, that would be incorrect on two fronts. Firstly, you would have to die first, and secondly, when you don’t know, you don’t kill each other over uncertainties. Spending your living years where you can actually make a difference for yourself, but believing exclusively in your path as right means you are living with prejudice and discrimination. Spiritually speaking, that’s nothing to be proud of, because it’s actually a spiritual flaw. Remember, you can’t involve God in your assumptions. If it is spiritually wrong, how will you justify it when your atom of autonomy, sitting right within you, judges everything you do?
Placing all your eggs of right and wrong in the basket of life after death or the cliff is unproven one hundred percent. Not by any religion nor by any other system of knowledge like science. I’m not trying to sow doubt in anyone’s individual faith, but I am urging people to stop killing each other over scenarios of life after death. One of the most politically charged or successful aspects religions have in common is instilling fear in the hearts of human beings, especially since people are terrified of their mortality. They want individuals to be fearful, weak, vulnerable, insignificant, unimportant, and even feel guilty for sins they may not have committed. Politically, it is easier to control individuals lacking in self-esteem. This strategy has worked in the past, so politically savvy people still employ these tactics. If you still live in your past and are passionate about the knowledge of your groups, you want to latch onto anything bigger and stronger than yourself simply to feel secure. Whether the assistance is visible or invisible, your weaknesses will make them even greater. Your loyalties to your personal spirituality over your belonging group are clear signs of your internal conflicts. You would rather be politically prejudiced and discriminatory than at peace with your atom of autonomy. Understanding who and what you really are can help you deal with your political sense of belonging from within.
If you believe that God lives physically through you, you would look at others as yourself. But if you are taught that you are good and others are bad, you have learned prejudice and discrimination. Yet the worst thing is believing that God Almighty is just like you as well. I hold God in a spiritually higher place than that, so to me, prejudice and discrimination are religious, but not spiritual.
Look at the physically functioning God, then look at the good people helping others in your opposing groups—what do you see? If you can’t see God working in all human societies, you are blinded by the political side of your religion. To me, God and spirituality are physically functioning in all human societies, meaning all ancestral footprints lead to the cliff of faith. When you put each other down, call your group good and godly while labeling others as bad and evil, it is clearly political. Learn to introspect about yourself and your group through your spiritual self.
You can nitpick and compare your belonging groups, believing your way is the right way and expecting everything to be cleared up by God after you die, but you continue living with the politics of prejudice and discrimination. That means, spiritually, you have it wrong. For instance, if you mispronounce God’s name because it was in a different language, it ultimately comes down to your intention, as God is within you as your atom of autonomy. It’s not a big deal. But if you commit a spiritual crime like being prejudicial and discriminatory against God’s people, even in your deeply private thoughts, your atom of autonomy knows it all. Remember, you don’t have to die to find out about your rights and wrongs if you listen to your atom of autonomy. How does your atom of autonomy let you know about right and wrong during your living years? If you do to someone what you don’t like done to you or your loved ones, it is a spiritual crime. Especially if you don’t want to be on the receiving end of prejudice and discrimination, think about how your atom of autonomy would take it, yet you commit this crime willy-nilly in the name of your belonging groups. Remember, every right and wrong needs your physicality, so it’s not about the afterlife but about your living years. Your atom of autonomy easily lets you know if you are in tune with it. If you ask about the guilt-related invisible pain, it is real; just ask war veterans.
Pick a religion, follow their footprint-related path, and without even going into the details of differences, you will end up on this metaphoric cliff of faith where footprints vanish. This is where it matters most: how you have lived your personal life, regardless of any religious faith. It all boils down to spirituality, not the politics of belonging groups. Since it is exclusively between God and the individual, you will personally have to either jump in with the hope of finding whatever your religion preached to you or create your own footprints by making sense of it all. Spiritually, if you are reciprocating and in sync with your atom of autonomy within, you have nothing to worry about—not about the religion you were born into, impressed by, or attracted to, or even doubts about what lies beyond the cliff of faith. You have to think about the main thing: your reciprocation during your living years. You have done your job during your living years. If reciprocation is what it’s all about, then understanding would be a big plus in dealing with your fear and lack of faith about the cliff of faith. Remember, it’s not about bowing down to God or fasting; it’s all about turning spirituality into physical actions to help the needy. Everything else is just to make you irrelevant so you can be controlled politically. What happens inside you is not a problem for the belonging groups, but it is up to you how you deal with your mortal life. If your sense of belonging and sense of freedom are out of sync, you could be in trouble from within, so it is essential for you to become a CEO and assume your responsibilities.
When we disrespect, bicker, argue, fight, and kill each other over our differences, individual faith is usually in question. Some of us put everything on God and believe blindly but still don’t agree to live with each other’s differences. Some of us don’t even believe in anything but shamelessly carry on living with the help of the unknown without acknowledgment. They don’t even bother to logically put things together to make sense of their life. For instance, we have absolutely no control over our life-giving oxygen and the functioning of the most complex organisms, like our bodies. Here we are, constantly functioning until the day we die, but we don’t think or respect the help we can’t live without. Ever wonder why? If you don’t even believe in God, how would you know the purpose of your life? Believe me, we are not like other creatures; we don’t just breathe, eat, excrete, reproduce, get sick, age, and die. Converting good and bad into physicality is a major job for a major player, but that major player is still at the mercy and within the control of our unknown realities.
Proof is in the pudding: we can’t just will our way to live; otherwise, none of us would die. Some of us don’t even give a second thought to acknowledge our blessings of being alive or the life-giving oxygen without which we cannot survive. Without spirituality, there can’t be a sense of responsibility for reciprocation, yet we have many people in all nations and religions who believe that giving or paying taxes is not their responsibility. They literally believe God would take care of the needy, but they don’t bother asking how things get done by God. Everything we do involves the help of the unknown, but we still think we are doing everything. Especially when it comes to answering questions about the origins and purpose of life. A non-faithful answer would be that we are just a random fluke of life and death with no purpose or meaning, but with faith, there are meanings. Yes, the purpose of our life is the duty of reciprocation, and that is converting spirituality into physical actions.
To me, faith is what it means: if there is help for me to breathe and even exist, that thought alone should make me humble. Personally, I should have some kind of faith and trust in that unknown I openly call God. Since there are people who believe there is no God, logically, they should not have faith in anything. Yet, looking at their life critically, you will see that they do have faith. They don’t think twice about their ability to take that next breath, plan their day, or even their life, yet they trust and have no doubt in the supply line of the oxygen they take in. Otherwise, they would die of the stress from hopelessness and uncertainty. Do you think that is happening? Just look around and even within yourself to find spirituality-related problems. If you think you suffer from spiritual deficiencies related to physical, mental, and emotional health, find that missing faith, which can have the power to give you hope and optimism. No, I am not talking about the faith our political religions preach.
Since I don’t believe that a religion or related God should have any kind of political agenda, I advocate for the love of faith, not the fear or greed of the carrot-and-stick philosophy. This means doing good not for the promise of heaven or the fear of hell, but for the duty of reciprocation as a physical being to a spiritual God. You are not irrelevant, unimportant, meaningless, or a born sinner. You are the main character in your life, regardless of what you have been told or preached. Always remember that spiritually good or even bad things and thoughts don’t just happen without your physical hands, shoulders, and back. Sure, you can believe in miracles, but don’t bet all your eggs in that basket. You can be a reasonably spiritual individual who knows their place in the grand scheme of life; you just have to become the CEO of your life.
Since we all think differently, we can have our opinions, but living a life with help yet denying the source of your help is actually denying certain unknown realities of faith with arrogance. It’s not what is, but how you look at it, and what faith means to you. If you openly deny the help itself, how can you even understand the spiritual responsibilities of reciprocation? If you do understand reciprocation, you already know spirituality. One does not have to be a religious person to be spiritual because spirituality is universal in humanity. There are many religious beliefs, so regardless of being religious or not, anyone can be spiritual.
Religions and nationalism may have a monopoly on the politics of a sense of belonging, but they can’t make all their followers good people. Spirituality is not in anyone’s control, nor does anyone have a monopoly over it.
We have been claiming that our knowledge is better and complete, yet we keep evolving to learn more and more. Believing that other people who don’t think like us are bad or inferior is absurd. Just as the good aspects of spirituality are universal, arrogance is one of the universal bad things in humanity.
Our ancestors were smart enough according to their era but believed in their group superiority. Although this is not rare in today’s world, we should not take pride in being prejudiced and discriminatory. It is our moral obligation not to deny anyone their equal human rights.
We have evolved from our bush and cave times when we used to kill each other just for belonging to different groups. As we have evolved, we made different communities, cities, nations, and religions with all their marked boundaries. Today, we are evolving to make our melting pot societies with thriving equal human rights. Regardless of the hard journey of civilization or, I should say, evolution, we still can’t get around killing each other. Just look around, and you will still find people who use the same bush and cave time philosophy. We claim that we are evolved and civilized, yet we still suffer from prejudice and discrimination-related killings as we did in bush and cave times. So, did we really evolve, or are we going in circles of the politics of belonging?
Why can’t we stop killing each other to take the next step of evolution? Why is our politics of belonging to our group so powerful? It is all about what goes on within the individual. If we accept our evolutionary nature, learn to understand our mortality, become the CEO of our lives, and practice spirituality-related equal human rights deep in our hearts individually, we can work together as human beings to embrace humanity as a whole.
Remember, our potential is evolving. So where are we going, and what can we do with all that potential? It’s like the ocean and space, all rolled up in one within a single cell or, I should say, one single human being. Now, look at our politics of belonging, which puts us in a pond with boundaries, making us feel exactly the opposite of what God meant for the human individual.
Religions claim that we are made in God’s image, but when it comes to practical life, they put us down so far and elevate God and the Devil so far ahead of us that we ourselves become insignificant and irrelevant. If we believe everything religions have been saying, we would all feel small, inferior, and even sinful with no self-esteem. We have been brainwashed and trained to be controlled for so long that we need courage to even question it all.
They resist everything a rule-breaker comes up with but shamelessly follow and use those technologies and medicines to live modern-day life. Yet interestingly, they still put down people who don’t believe in their religion. Their politics of belonging to groups shouts so loudly that a questioning individual’s voice is suppressed at all costs, even to the point of killing people just because of political loyalties to their belonging groups. The politics of belonging not only makes them dance against spirituality but also makes them hypocrites.
On the other hand, if you look at the success of Western societies, you will see that they have been encouraging and promising better lives to attract talent from all over the world for centuries. This has made them far more sophisticated and advanced, yet they still can’t overcome the turmoil related to prejudice and discrimination in their populations.
Personally, I believe no one can be better than others just because of belonging to a certain group, race, gender, skin color, nation, or religious beliefs. Spiritually, each and every one of us carries an atom of autonomy within from before birth. We may look different, but we are all literally one organism, like a coral reef. Physically, we are all made of the same things (ask a scientist), we are born the same way (ask a doctor), we all need food to live, we need sleep to function, we reproduce, get sick, age, and die the same way. So what is the problem with adopting a spiritual principle like equal human rights? Our problems are simply related to our politics of belonging to our groups.
Regardless of the good education of religion to be a good person, there is a disconnection. They preach compassion and all the good spiritual things, but in practical life, they are the worst enemies of each other. They literally separate the “com” from the “passion.” They bring God to boost their believers with passion, and both God and the individual get politically used. They kill each other with passionate wars yet preach compassion. The politics of belonging to groups has infiltrated all aspects of the human individual.
The real answer to our politics of belonging is to strengthen the individual so that in today’s societies we can have our modern-day solutions. Since equal human rights work against prejudice and discrimination, one has to become a CEO to be able to even understand the cause of our problems. Equal human rights make perfect spiritual sense because you and your loved ones personally don’t want to be on the receiving end of prejudice and discrimination. If you are spiritually inept, you will look at life as a creature who is still in bush and cave times, marking territories and killing each other for resources. If that is still your game, understand yourself as an evolving entity and evolve, for God’s sake.
Personally, how far have you evolved on the scale of spirituality? Answer yourself honestly because you have that ability within you. Your atom of autonomy is sitting right inside you—a powerful entity. However, if you are deeply insecure due to thousands of years of brainwashing, your politics of belonging can override everything you think. This can lead you to a place where you have clashing forces within you, which is not a good place for a mortal being with a short time to live.
Regardless of which side dominates you, you will end up in trouble if you don’t become the CEO of your life. Since you have the potential to go either way, suppressing your atom of autonomy will make you a puppet for your belonging group, putting you at odds with your inner autonomy. That atom of autonomy is like God within you, so going against it would not be a good place to be. If you become the CEO by liberating yourself from the politics of belonging to your groups, you can join and accept humanity as a whole. This is the worst nightmare for political groups because they lose power and become irrelevant. Understand that it is not God who made you insignificant, irrelevant, unimportant, or a born sinner. Other human beings have made you lose your self-esteem so you can be politically controlled.
In reality, you are the third equation of the whole spiritual picture. Any thought cannot be good or bad until it becomes a physical action. Remember, the human individual is responsible for getting things done. We all carry an atom of autonomy related to free will, which makes us choose to do good or bad. Without you, God and the Devil lose their physical ability to help or hurt. Take pride in being that important. Evolve spiritually and become a CEO so you don’t get used politically by other human beings to do devilish things. Sure, your belonging group would back you up even if you commit spiritual crimes in their name, even if your belonging group is your religion.
People with political interests do not want you to become a CEO and reach your evolving potential. They want to keep you trapped in a pond philosophy, which keeps weaker individuals seeking visible boundaries. Remember, these boundaries are artificially created for you to feel secure. Your sense of security is related to your imagination, which cuts both ways: it can trap you and make you stop your expanding potential, or it can liberate you to believe that there is life beyond those boundaries. It will all come down to you and how you use your faith and imagination.
A spiritually weaker individual can’t become the CEO of their life. Being weak forces the individual to seek security by attaching to belonging groups. Not only do you seek security because of insecurity, but your self-esteem would also have taken a hit. The lower the self-esteem, the higher the desire to belong to something majestic. Believing in God is one thing, but believing in other human beings as security is absurd because they can’t even be secure for themselves. How can they provide to others what they don’t have for themselves? The politics of belonging is a living, breathing example. You kill and die for other human beings in the name of God. Give your head a shake because politics and spirituality simply don’t mix. Religions often get God involved in human emotional actions, giving God a bad name.
If you believe that you belong to the best group of people, it means you believe you are better than others just because of belonging. Think about it with a clear head and see where your prejudice and discrimination are coming from. One can only be better by building a good spiritual character through reciprocation. I personally don’t believe that believing in any one particular religion is the key to eternal heaven. It’s all about your personal spirituality and related physical action based on reciprocation.
Belonging to a family of a prophet does not give you a license to be good. Your physical actions are the only thing that has the power to make you a good or bad person. If you want to talk about heaven, talk about the one you have at hand while you are living and breathing, where you are still in charge of your actions and choices. If you are creating hell for others, you are setting yourself up for hell. If you are creating heaven while you are living, you have nothing to worry about in this life or after death.
You might say, “I am always suffering in this life because my desires are never fulfilled, and my life is a failure. Since I suffered in my living years, I should go to heaven after I die.” This is a good excuse for hope and optimism, but it’s not good enough. Personally, I believe there is nothing wrong with having a hopeful scenario about the afterlife, but if you are suffering because you want too much and are not putting in the matching effort, remember that God has done the godly job of providing you with a functioning body and free oxygen. Now it is up to you to create your happiness by counting your blessings. You are personally responsible for the reasons for your unhappiness. A while back, I wrote a blog about the ladder of horizon, where I discussed how we compare ourselves with others to create or lose our contentment. The idea was to look up to the people above on the ladder for inspiration and look below you for appreciation. If you build a habit of being unhappy, even if you end up going to heaven, you may still be unhappy. That literally means if you don’t compare yourself with both sides, even God would not be able to make you happy.
Spiritual awareness encourages gratitude for the things already provided to you, like oxygen and a functioning body. Be sure to appreciate your blessings instead of criticizing everything you have. Common complaints such as “I am not rich,” “I am not strong,” “I am too fat,” “too thin,” “too short,” or “not so good-looking or lucky” should be reconsidered. Always remember that dissatisfaction is ingrained in our DNA because of our evolving nature. We have to keep evolving, but as individuals with free will and potential CEO status, we all have a major problem with our mortality. Harnessing all the unhealthy imagination-related “what ifs” is not easy, especially in modern-day living, so assuming the duties of a CEO is in order.
Becoming a CEO can help us look at life with a healthy outlook; otherwise, we have the potential to spend our whole allotted time on a platform waiting for a train that never comes (back to the pond philosophy).
Human beings have proven time and again that there is life beyond our insecurity-related boundaries. Interestingly, it was always done by people who did not accept living within accepted boundaries.
From the belief in a flat earth to space exploration and recognizing the earth as round, from discovering land beyond oceanic horizons to advances in medicine like genetic code breakdowns, stem cells, or even test-tube babies, to developments in science and technology, evolution has been a journey that is just beginning. So, where are we going? Only time will tell, but the way we treat each other with prejudice and discrimination will be looked down upon by future generations.
Today we know the path of storms; we prepare and save lives, so we no longer have to throw virgins over cliffs just because our religious leaders say God is mad at us. Even this coronavirus has brought humanity to its knees, but most people, regardless of their religious background, are still looking to our scientists for answers. No matter what happens or how far we have evolved, we still kill each other over our prejudiced and discriminatory politics of belonging groups. Just look at our wars. Even a common enemy like the coronavirus, which did not discriminate against anyone, could not unite us to the point that we could stop killing each other in the name of our belonging groups. After all that, I can safely say that our work to evolve is by no means done. We not only have to learn to work together but also have to deal with the politics of belonging. We individually have to get out of our ponds and learn to belong to the ocean of humanity so we can bring equal human rights to overcome the politics of our belonging groups. If we let our groups—race, gender, nations, or religions—decide for us, they have not solved our problems in thousands of years. Would you wait for another two thousand years for humanity to solve its social problems? Personally, I don’t have that much time left, so I have to take this off my chest and say what I believe is correct.
As an individual born in a scientifically and technologically advanced era, I feel deeply responsible to critically think and examine everything we do individually. I encourage and suggest everyone do the same because the stakes are way too high to merge our ancestral knowledge-related memories with constantly evolving war weaponry. With our modern-day weaponry, the potential to kill each other over our incomplete and politically divisive knowledge should not be acceptable.
We already have hundreds of nations with different races, colors, and even religions and their sects. With our politics of belonging in the forefront and passionate loyalties to religions in the background, we are heading towards nuclear conflicts to create the predicted day of judgment.
Let’s look at our old and politically biased knowledge with clear eyes. With equal human rights flourishing all over the world, we are individually being torn apart between a sense of belonging to our groups and someone asking for equal human rights.
Newer and modern-day questions of humanity are hard to answer for individuals under the influence of the politics of belonging. If your sense of belonging has you under its influence, but you somehow end up on the receiving end of prejudice and discrimination, you would love to have equal human rights, not only for yourself but for your children as well. No one desires to be treated as a second-class citizen just because of their background, belief systems, or skin color.
We all need to be able to question everything because, as humanity, we have evolved and are evolving rapidly, especially in the last fifty or sixty years. Our outdated constitutional or religious rules do not comply with or are not practical according to the progress or evolution of society. Sure, not all individuals evolve at the same rate, but as societies, we should get our act together before it’s too late.
What should be done about that? Should we let people fight and rob each other’s love as they have been doing with their ancestral knowledge? Today’s era belongs to equal human rights, so we can’t be fighting and killing each other over our ancestry-related prejudicial and discriminatory education. We should simply enforce equal human rights as the rule of law all over the world. Remember, it is not the demands of the times that have to change; it is our previously popular rules that are no longer popular and will have to change. If you like to keep the status quo as it was thousands of years ago, you are the one who is going to be in trouble from within yourself because you can’t be happy if things don’t go your way.
For instance, our politics of belonging calls for prejudicial and discriminatory behavior against each other, but that does not match or suit our equal human rights era, especially with our war weaponry. We all have to sober up from the intoxicating sense of belonging to our groups. Remember, in today’s era, if you are a racist, religious extremist, or nationalist, you are considered a prejudicial and discriminatory individual. This is not, and should not be considered, a compliment for modern-day human beings.
Due to our evolutionary nature, evolution has been, is, and will always be a fact of humanity. Especially in today’s era, if you look at our science, technology, medicine, and even social liberation, no one in their right mind can deny these realities. If you want to stay hundreds or even thousands of years behind, do so, but don’t expect everyone else to stay with you.
Today, you just can’t kill your way to the top like it has been done in the past. In today’s world, if you try to force your ancestral ways of living on others, you will be met with force you can’t bear, especially when your own kids and family stand against you.
It would be like trying to put all the worms back in the can, but you literally just can’t. You try to put one in, and another one escapes. Unfortunately, your choices can create not only external hardship for you and others, but you may also suffer in other known and unknown areas as well. Remember, what goes on within yourself can eat you alive. If you are a controlling individual and don’t like changes around you, life can become hard. Especially when even your family and friends are changing with time, and you have no control over them. The feelings from within can make you angry and frustrated all the time, so spare some energy for living life with compassion and acceptance.
We all individually need to take charge of our thoughts related to emotional health. Long story short, in a nutshell, what I am trying to say is to understand your place as a CEO. Do your part to keep your mental, emotional, physical, and spiritual health in check and remove your self-created harms before you seek help.
Religious rules, traditions, customs, and rituals can be important to you, but as a mortal, your health should supersede everything. It should be a personal priority because if you are not well, you simply can’t be happy. If you are not healthy and happy, your religion has not done its job in helping you in the ways it should.
If mortality is a fact of human life, our personal input into the quality of life is our choice. That means we individually can choose how to live our mortal life. If faith can help an individual live a mortal life with some spirituality-related hope and optimism, then why not? At the end of the day, creating problems by following the prejudicial and discriminatory rules of certain groups—whether it is religious extremism, nationalism, or racism—is a choice, and a choice is a choice no matter how you look at it.
Sure, our religions talk about unquestionable and blind faith, but our spirituality-related religious education often gets buried under the politics of belonging to our groups. Interestingly, even our prophets could not stay clear of group politics because they preached for and against philosophies, not accepting humanity as a whole. So, what does this really mean? It means even God Almighty takes a back seat when it comes to the politics of our belonging groups. Whether it is about our race, nation, or religions and their sects, their politics calls for group domination over everyone else.
Regardless of what I say, you can still benefit from religious education because it does preach and talk about spiritual jewels like compassion, forgiveness, sacrifice, helping the needy, and above all, hope and optimism. Unfortunately, the real and powerful problem is again the politics of belonging to our groups. Our sympathies and loyalties are limited to our groups because we have been taught from a tender age to be loyal to our groups. We have been and are still taught a lot more about the politics of belonging than real spirituality.
God and spirituality preach everything universally and should not be limited to a group of people. If we look at life through the lens of any one particular religious point of view, it teaches prejudice and discrimination, not only against other groups but against the followers who don’t adhere as well. That means even God and spirituality become politically tainted, which I don’t believe represents the real God or real spirituality.
This is where I find things have gone wrong in our religions. If your religion claims that you can only go to heaven by following the path of that particular religion, you have been sold the politics of belonging. If that received education is overwhelming for you and you have put it above all of your education, they have succeeded in brainwashing you to grow up biased, prejudiced, and discriminatory. Yet you were born with spiritual jewels like a personal sense of justice, compassion, forgiveness, sacrifice, and love ingrained within your DNA, with a choice for all humanity, not limited to a group of people.
Remember, politics and spirituality can’t be mixed because one is simply nothing but the truth, and the other is there to twist the truth to benefit one particular group of people over everyone else. That political intervention has had and still is robbing us all of our personal spirituality. Regardless of what you have been told that your religion is the only favorite religion to God and no one can go to heaven if they are not part of it, politics aside, you have to understand the importance of personal spiritual character before you accept God as a biased, prejudiced, and discriminatory entity.
When you want to do good things for others but only for your belonging group exclusively, you are being political. If you do it for all human beings equally, that would be clearly spiritual. I am not going to use any name of religion, but I am going to try to make my point.
Say you belong to one religion, and you know that you are in a position to help, but the needy belong to another religion. If you try to convert the needy into your religion, you have crossed the spiritual lines and clearly have become a politician. If you avoid helping because you want to help only the needy who believe in the same religion you do, it means you are under the influence of the politics of belonging. Yet, the act of helping is spiritual, and spirituality is unquestionably universal and blind to any faith, just as need is blind to all faiths.
Regardless of who you are, what color, gender, nation, or religion you are born into, you should clearly understand and always remember that as a human being, you can’t deny your mortal nature. Your faith-related quality of life is still your personal prerogative, but remember your spiritual actions always fall into the realm of optional, even if they are your reciprocation.
Let’s look at it this way: What does Hu mean to you? In my opinion, Hu represents our spiritual side, which is mixed with our physical bodies deep inside our DNA long before our conception. When you mix Hu with a man or woman’s body, then and only then do they become human beings. So the question is, do you consider yourself a man or a woman exclusively, or a human first? If you call yourself a human being, you automatically consist of God or a spiritual side from within. Since we can’t survive or live separately, our choices should be made as whole human beings.
I don’t want to slip too far into assumptions, so I’ll try to keep it simple. In a nutshell, I am talking about the atom of autonomy, which is carried by each and every living, breathing human being. Regardless of belonging groups, our atom of autonomy makes everyone part of humanity and God simultaneously.
If you consider yourself just a man or a woman, you disregard your Hu, which exclusively makes you a body or just a physical being. Being without the Hu makes a man live like a creature who marks territories more like animals. Always remember, being just a man is actually less than being a human being, so you can’t take pride in it.
You can have all the scientific and technological knowledge or even religious knowledge, but if it is without spirituality, you simply don’t pass the test of being a spiritual human being. Simply, spirituality is what makes or breaks you; it can take you apart from God or make you a physical and crucial part of God Almighty.
If you are born into a group of people who don’t really value or possess spiritual jewels like a personal sense of justice, compassion, tolerance, forgiveness, sacrifice, and love for others, they usually would not believe in programs like social work and related assistance, universal health care, and other community help for the weak and vulnerable. It simply is not healthy itself, so it is spiritually bankrupt. As individuals, if we are blessed with more than we need, it is our duty to reciprocate for the free oxygen and a functioning body. If we take, take, and take, the idea of humanity carrying on dies. You may ask, what can go wrong if I don’t pay my dues or taxes? Well, the one percent and ninety-nine percent-related problems are already here. I am no fan of socialism because it is not spiritually just for the individual, but when humanity becomes spiritually bankrupt and people die of hunger while some have more than they can consume, I will speak against all kinds of hoarding.
People like to go to mosques, churches, and temples because of religious duties or to attend rituals and pray, but they ignore the essence of religious knowledge. Yes, I am talking about spirituality-related practical prayers. If you are a religious individual but don’t believe in social programs because you have been taught or personally believe that they come from socialism, you need to wake up and smell the spiritual roses. To me, if spiritual things are not physically practiced in worshiping places like mosques, churches, and temples, they are made for political purposes, not for spiritual fulfillment. Personally, I believe all religious places should be exclusively spiritual so they can help the needy beyond their religious beliefs.
Always remember, a religion without spirituality is just a political system, or I should say a spiritually impotent political organization, which is there to conform the individual into a puppet. Individually, focus on the practical prayers like helping the needy or simply believe in paying taxes as part of your reciprocation for free oxygen and a functioning body. As human beings, we need to understand that reciprocation is not only limited to God and the community but within our relationships as well. If you share, pull your load, and help each other to make each other’s life easier, the world would be a lot more peaceful in all aspects of life.