There is the well known story of a visitor to Belfast who was asked, ‘What is your religion?’ He replied that he was Jewish. ‘Yes’, his questioner persisted, ‘but are you a Protestant Jew or a Catholic Jew?’
peace
Different civilisations have different paradigms or basic assumptions about the world and these are usually provided by the dominant religion. For example, belief in karma and reincarnation is very widespread in India. Further, doctrine, the fourth dimension, which is the articulated expression of belief, can be very divisive as has been seen especially in the history of the Christian church
The material dimension, the seventh dimension, which includes distinctive dress as well as buildings, also can be a cause of conflict. Marcus recalls that he visited an Orthodox church in Patmos where his wife, Mary, mentioned our concern for Christian unity, but the guide (a different one!) spoke of her fear that the Roman Catholics would come and take away their icons.
Two dimensions may provide a basis for unity. One is the ethical, the fifth dimension, and this underlies attempts to articulate a Global Ethic. The other is the experiential, which is Smart’s second dimension. A conversion or evangelical experience may give such certainty as to create intolerance of others, but a more mystical experience may suggest that the glory of God transcends all human knowledge so that no one religion can claim a monopoly of truth.
The dimension, not so far mentioned, which is probably the most likely to be divisive is the social, which links religion with personal identity and is intertwined with several of the other dimensions. Richard Gombrich, who is Professor of Sanskrit at the Oxford University and a social anthropologist, has written:
Whether we like it or not, it would be blind not to admit that for most people in the modern world religion is first of all an identity, a label, a badge of allegiance of a group. What is your religion? it says on the form, and the terrorist asks the same question. Protestant and Catholic in Ulster, Hindu and Sikh in the Punjab... In this sense religion cannot be quite separated from politics or indeed from racism.
Gombrich goes on to say that in defining a religion,
the first answer which occurs to someone from a Christian background is likely to be that religion is a matter of belief, particularly of belief in God. But half the world does not think in these terms. For them, religion is first and foremost what you do, not what you think. A Hindu or a Jew must avoid certain foods.
There is the well known story of a visitor to Belfast who was asked, ‘What is your religion?’ He replied that he was Jewish. ‘Yes’, his questioner persisted, ‘but are you a Protestant Jew or a Catholic Jew?’