By Joe LaGuardia
Last week I wrote about violence against Christians and Muslims in Nigeria. It wasn’t the only time I wrote about conflict on the global stage, nor will it be my last.
I feel that, as an author on the religion page, it is one of my jobs to educate you, dear reader, in what is going on beyond our community to remind all of us of the work of God and the cause of peace that remains before us, even if it is not at our doorstep.
I am not ignorant to the fact that conflict has always been an issue for us humans; and I fear that it will be around far longer than I will walk this earth. Yet, I also believe that we assess conflict in our world differently than we have in years past, sometimes to our detriment.
Yesteryear, people learned about conflicts by reading newspapers and watching a couple of broadcasts. When the Vietnam war was underway, people got news from a media that largely agreed on the facts that made for headline news.
These days, our news comes to us in snippets through a variety of sources ranging from traditional media to the internet. This does make us a more-informed people, but it can also be confusing.
Our large planet grows ever smaller with 24-hour news cycles and real-time reporting.
In order to make sense of this fragmented source data, however, cable news networks now provide “commentary” on the news. But it is commentary that is biased, often to the extreme poles of our unique ideologies.
This makes for exciting news, but not for news that promotes peace and reconciliation in local and international communities. Often, this kind of news-reporting does the opposite: It creates “sides” in debates and adds fuel to (in)tense conflicts that can sometimes get blown out of proportion.
One “victim” of this type of sensational media is our understanding of the world’s largest religions. I bet if you were to poll a bunch of people, you would get various opinions about, say, Christianity — opinions formed not by the truths that exist in the belief system itself but based on caricatures of Christians from the news.
In fact, some of these surveys already exist. Surveys of people ages 18-34, for instance, consistently show that a majority of people in this age group have a negative perception of Christianity. This negativity stems not from the reality of what Christians believe, but on what those who are surveyed perceive to be true about Christians based on what they’ve heard in the news or the movies.
Same can be said of Islam. Although a majority of people have a favorable view towards American Muslims, only 44% of evangelicals have a positive view of Muslims, according to a report in the Christian Post. A majority of people who are religious also fear living near a Muslim mosque.
One of the ways to combat the misunderstanding of any religion is to be educated on what religions are really about. Although every religion has a radical minority longing to convert others by means of violence, intimidation, or coercion, a majority of the world’s religions are positive, peaceful contributors to society.
Yet, if our only information of the world’s religions come by way of a sensational media or neighbors who believe in stereotypes rather than the reality of what religions are all about, then our misinformation can foster greater conflict rather than dialogue and healthy community formation.
A well-rounded education is essential, and understanding provides a path to greater conversations grounded in reality.
And with a world torn asunder by conflict, religious or otherwise, it becomes ever more important to learn about the religions of people who are our neighbors, allied nations, and–perhaps someday–our very friends. May the Prince of Peace guide our path.
Dr. Joe LaGuardia serves as Interfaith Congregational Liaison for the Cooperative Baptist Fellowship of Georgia.
He is also pastor of Trinity Baptist Church, which is hosting a 10-week seminar “Tour of World Religions” free and open to the public beginning Wednesday, January 7th, at 6:45 PM.
