When I first saw this quote today, it resonated resoundingly in my heart as Truth with a capital T. Goosebumps, which are what I call my ‘Truth Barometer’ rose on my arms. There are some who are reading these words who may disagree and yet, to the best of my knowledge, both as an interfaith minister and a human being who has lived on the third rock from the sun for a bit more than 55 years, I have learned that religion is meant to unite and not divide. When people ascribe to the idea that ‘their God is better than’ someone else’s, we are in deep doo doo. All manner of violence, both physical and verbal have ensued as a result. What if, as a collective humanity, we looked at religion as different ways of ‘voting for’ the God of our understanding and lived as if the love that is at the core of all spiritual traditions was who were born to be? If we see ourselves as love incarnate, we could ask ourselves WWLD? What would love do? I know I have shared that before, but it bears repeating. How would you go through your day to day, knowing that love is never wasted, that everyone with whom you crossed paths was a brother or sister traveler on the journey? What judgments could we release if we knew that we were all, as Ram Dass says “Walking each other home.”?
Too often, people use their interpretation of religious doctrine and dogma as justification for enslaving, abusing or otherwise causing harm to others. One of my favorite songs about this subject was written by singer songwriter John Flynn. It is called Not With My Jesus and it speaks to the idea that no religion has a monopoly on salvation, that a God of love, loves us all equally.
http://youtu.be/birIfEtYsdM Not With My Jesus by John Flynn
and another musical friend named Billy Jonas offers his deepest heart knowing that God is in all things, even those people and actions we might see as irreverent or sacrilegious.
http://youtu.be/BKZ82oo-jN0 God is In by Billy Jonas
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