Objectives of Interfaith Study 04-22-06

Edit note: This is part of a correspondence that I had over email with a friend of mine. The conversation that you missed was some exchange of both his and my ideas on Buddhism. I've deleted the opening paragraph, and several lines in the text.

Let's ask: What is the objective of interfaith study?

After all, in all honesty, human beings rarely seek information just for the sake of seeking information. We either get some fulfillment from it, or we’re hoping to do something with it. I always read US magazine in the supermarket for gossip on the stars. Why? Well, it just amuses the hell out of me. Sometimes, we learn so that we can accomplish something by learning, such as studying for a bachelor’s degree or a professional license. Sometimes we study because we want to do something with the information, like buy the right house.

So, why do we, as Christians, study other religions? Or, why do we study the differences between Christian sects, say Pentecostal and Roman Catholic? Do we get fulfillment from it? If so, how? Are we hoping to do something with it? If so, what?

Let me propose several basic reasons: Apologetics, peacemaking, enrichment, and conversion. If we study for apologetics, we are hoping to defend the Christian faith against the attacks of other religions. If we study for peacemaking, we are studying to understand other faiths that we might find bridges of loving communication with them. If we study for enrichment, we are hoping to improve our own spiritual practices and beliefs by finding the good in other’s practices and beliefs. And, finally, if we study for conversion, we seek understanding of the values within the culture of the other religion so that we might tailor our message of Christ to that culture.

My personal objectives for interfaith study are peacemaking and enrichment.

To go about this, however, I have found to be both unnatural and difficult. But, I’ve spent some real time thinking about it, and have come to some useful methods.

The first is to seek empathic listening. This is a Steven Covey term, from the “7 habits of highly effective people”. He says, seek first to understand then to be understood. We have the same line in the St. Francis Prayer, too. “Master, grant that I might not seek so much to be understood, but to understand.”

Empathic listening is listening to someone without internal commentary, without comparing it to my own experiences, without coming up with rebuttals, and without judging. It is listening to their words, and seeking to understand their ideas and their feelings from their point of view. It’s important to note that empathic listening is not the same as sympathetic listening, which is listening to agree. It is listening to understand. It is the single most difficult thing I have ever tired. It involves moving the self out of the way to really listen to another point of view.

Of course, seeking to understand is part of loving and peacemaking. I love my wife. And, to love her, one of the best things I can do is to listen to her empathically, to hear her words and her feelings all the way through without coming up with my own commentary or rebuttals. (Like I said, it is the hardest thing I’ve ever tried.) But, isn’t that the way that I want others to listen to me? I want them to hear what I’m saying, not make commentary in their own head! I want my daughter to be heard this way, too. So, listening is an act of love. And, Christ tells us to love, even to love our enemies. The first step to peace is listening.

It’s also the first step to salesmanship. If the goal of interfaith study is to convert the world to Christ, the salesmen should know to listen to the customer. The customer is always right, his views and feelings are valid. And, nobody is going to convert if they are not valued as individuals. People change their minds when they are shown the validity of a new way from their own perspective. Or, as the saying goes: A man convinced against his will is of the same opinion still.

Now, when it comes to interfaith study, there are some traps that I’ve found. I’d like to spell out two of them: one is the distinction between tribal behavior and religious dogma; the other is the distinction between philosophy (or theology) and practice.

Dogma is the core of a belief: e.g. Jesus is god, there is no God but God and Muhammad is his prophet, the eightfold path leads to enlightenment, etc. But, the reality of religion is much greater than dogma.

On of the most important aspects of a person’s religion is their belonging. One huge benefit that we get from being Christian is that we belong to a huge club of people who call themselves Christian. In the individual parishes, congregations, and communities, belonging is the key to all the activity. The human feeling of belonging is so important that it alone can change lives.

It is important to separate belonging, or tribalism, from dogma. Gay bashing, abortion clinic bombing, or death penalty promoting Christians are not acting out dogma. They are acting out belonging. They are members of a club, part of a tribe, and doing what the tribe is doing. There are downsides and upsides to tribalism. The upsides include a deep sense of community, which strengthens our faiths and lets us learn in a loving setting. The downsides are the tendency to not openly question the central tenants of the faith, as well as a historical tendency for tribal feuds. Religious wars most often have nothing to do with dogma or theology. They are just two tribes of people who hate each other, in spite of the irony that usually both of their dogmas preach peace and love.

In understanding other faiths, it is important to separate the tribe’s behavior from the faith’s dogma. They are often very different.

The next distinction I’ve found helpful is to separate theology of philosophy from practice or devotion. The best example illustrates this point. Muslims pray five times a day. They literally wake up before sunrise to say their morning prayers, which are memorized and take a good fifteen minutes including a ritual washing of the hands and face and feet. They also stay up past sunset to nearly midnight to say the last prayers. You don’t have to agree with Islamic theology to recognize the devotion of these practices. And, if you fail to recognize the devotion of these practices due to a disagreement with some theological aspect, you’ve missed a great opportunity to appreciate devotion. I’ve come to regard the study of devotion or religious practice as a separate issue from philosophy or theology. No matter what faith they emanate from, good devotional practices can almost always be valuable to learn about.

Out of the objectives that I mentioned before: Apologetics, peacemaking, enrichment, and conversion, I’ve talked about all but one. I saved apologetics for last.

Apologetics, to me, is the eggshell of the group. I know that apologetics is an important subject in Christian theology. It’s been a subject at seminaries and divinity schools since St. Thomas’ Suma Theological. But, it seems to me that apologetics must be handled correctly to be beneficial.

One can hardly go wrong with an objective of peacemaking, enrichment, or even conversion (assuming of course that one are not willing to convert the masses by force). But, apologetics can be done in two ways: one is by espousing the attractive value of the Christian faith (which I’ll call positive apologetics), and the other is by beating up on other religions (which I’ll call negative apologetics).

Think of some of the great works of negative apologetics and their historical consequences.

When St. Auguistine wrote “City of God” he laid out a spectacular vision of the Christian utopian society, in a world that was free of those damn godless heathens. A few twists and turns aside, the Christians of Europe actually set out to rid the world of those heathens, in the crusades.

Martin Luther, in his reformation of the Christian church, vocally condemned the Jews for the execution of Christ and for not recognizing the true faith. He did it in German, and the Germans took him seriously. While it is wrong to blame Luther for the holocaust, it is true that it couldn’t have happened without him.

Of course, the Catholic Church went on the defensive after Martin Luther, and condemned the Protestants. That worked out really well for Ireland. The protestant churches responded in kind, saying all kinds of nasty things about Catholics, who wound up on the KKK's hit list. (The KKK’s sales pitch in Alabama was “Do you hate niggers, jews and catholics?”)

In summary, I’ve tried to be very careful in the study of other faiths. Keeping positive objectives in mind and being cautious about some common traps has helped me a lot. I truly believe that the study of other religious traditions than my own can greatly benefit my spiritual path.