My high school was a community-oriented
institution and it always strived to be of great asset to the neighboring
communities. As a result, community service was part of the curriculum with a
minimum of a hundred hours required in two years for one to be able to
graduate. But there was one thing ‘interesting’ about our community service
projects – they never included working with churches. In fact, working with
churches was not considered community service and didn’t count towards the
hours to fulfill this requirement. As a religious fanatic, this has always
concerned me. Coming to this class, I was looking forward to the experience of
doing community service in religiously diverse community.
In addition in to
not including churches in the community service realm at the IB (international
Baccalaureate) school, my high school strongly advised against religious talks.
One of their main concerns was proselytizing. One of the typical questions the
admissions asked during interviewing was ‘What would you do if you were a
friend with someone of different religion than that of yours?’ if one answered,
‘I would try to convert him/her to my faith’ their chances of being admitted significantly
decreased. In fact, most of the kids that responded this way never made it into
the school. In addition, the community service described that is religious
related as ‘a sensitive and difficult area’ that the school doesn’t want to
indulge in [1]. In another document, the school explains that ‘any activity
that can be interpreted as proselytizing does not count as service’ [2]. Having
taken this class, I now understand the sensitivity of religious beliefs and the
controversy surrounding what is proselytizing. But the big question then become,
does it mean that we should wrap it under the rug and pretend it doesn’t exist
so we can make our lives easier?
When studying
proselytizing in this class, I got to appreciate the controversial nature of
proselytizing and what exactly is defined as proselytizing. Despite this
realization, being ambitious and ‘naïve’ college students, most people in the
group were for the idea that doing nothing and avoiding controversial topics like
this wasn’t really a solution. (The Naïve is a quote from one of a panel member
from a group of panelist that came in the middle of the class to give answer
some of the question we had about doing religious and interfaith work. The
speaker said that as college student we can experiment with a lot of things and
get away with it, unlike the real world).
Personally, I believe such an approach creates tolerance but not
understanding. I see tolerance as knowing that there are differences but too
afraid to discuss those differences. Understanding, on the other hand, goes
beyond acknowledging that differences exist and examine how and why those
differences exist. Some of the
questions that I wouldn’t have asked my Jewish or Muslim or Atheist, I was able
to ask in this class. In fact, I also see tolerance as pretending that the
differences do not exist. As Ed Stetzer comments in his article about
proselytizing, ‘Pretending that we all believe the same thing does not foster
dialogue but in fact prohibits it. By assuming that all religions teach the
same thing, how are we to explore, consider, and dialogue concerning
differences?’ [3] At the same time, when pursuing this understanding (through
dialogue), one needs to realize that there are stages in the conversations that
will take place. In short, pretence might not be entirely a bad thing in the
early stages of building a long lasting understanding. At the beginning of the
class everyone was tiptoeing around the faith discussions until we got close to
each other and then the ‘juicy’ stuff started coming out.
My other
concern about avoiding controversy by keeping our distance is that some people
that really need a helping hand are deprived of the assistance they might be
getting. When I think of this prospect, I feel very bad. I remember the second
from last class we had an activity to allocate funds and community service
hours to different organizations with different philosophies and different
religious affiliation (if they were affiliated at all). Each person in the
group was given a different stand and had to fight for it. I was to enforce the
idea that charity begins at home, no matter what the circumstances are. I
remember one of the listed organizations was about supporting children my paying
their school fees but since they weren’t from my home state, I had to oppose
the idea of helping them. It was an awkward feeling doing this since inside I
was agreeing with the idea.
In conclusion, this
class has been a very transformative experience in terms of understanding the
nuts and bolts of the controversial nature of proselytizing and the
consequences it comes with. Shunning away from this controversy is not a
worthwhile a solution except being momentarily, as long as one manages to avoid
interaction religion. A Martin Luther King Jr. asserted, ‘everyone can be
great, because anybody can serve.’ With more individuals willing to understand
different religious faith rather than tolerate them, I see a different world in
the next generation.
Works Cited
[1] http://www.krucli.com/IB_CAS_Facts.pdf
[2] http://www.stantoncollegeprep.org/IB/Handbook.pdf
[3] Stetzer Ed, Proselytizing in a Multi-Faith World, http://www.christianitytoday.com/ct/2011/april/proselytizingmultifaith.html
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