In Loveland Colorado, an art exhibit is creating a stir over a controversial painting depicting Jesus in a sexually explicit context. The skeptical sloganeers regularly cite how violent religion is, that religion breeds violence in its adherents. Is this true, does religion promote violence? The answer, some do. Well, one in particular.
Had this been a depiction of Muhammad, swift retaliation on the part of Muslims would be as certain as death and taxes. Think back to the planned Qur’an burning, without a single Qur’an being put to flame, there was outrage and planned violence over seas. Remember the Danish cartoon which sparked violence from Muslims. Yale recently cancelled a book it was planning which would have re-published the cartoons for fear of violence. A Seattle cartoonist is now in hiding after proposing “everybody draw Muhammad day“.
The point is, not all religions are the same. There is a reason Christian icons are fair game for such public displays of disrespect and contempt. No one fears violence from Christians. People walk on eggshells when it comes to criticisms of Muhammad, knowing there is a real probability of violent aftermath. Even speaking of Islam’s violent past, and present for that matter, is walked upon lightly, and always prefaced with painting violent Muslims as misrepresenting Islam, or hijacking an otherwise peaceful religion, (neither of which is true). A retaliation not feared for desecration of images or statuettes of Jesus. Christianity has long been the whipping boy of the growing secular atmosphere of America. It is almost considered trendy and even encouraged to ridicule Christians and Christianity publicly.
My point is, notice the difference, keep it in mind. Not all religions are the same, the differences do matter.
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Related articles:Fanning The Flames, Religion Is Peace?, Do Differences Matter?
Sifting Reality 
Christianity is not a tolerant religion. Ask all the heretics, witches and pagans killed in the most innovatively horrible ways by christians. How were these christians different in their faith from those of this day? Christianity is not more tolerant than the Islam. For centuries the jews for example had it much better in islamic countries than in Europe. The difference between the tolerance of religious ridicule in the Western World and in the islamic countries is due to the general level of education. It was possible for the culture to produce higher level of education in the Western World as a result of agressive colonial conquest and the wealth it produced. Higher education however means higher understanding of the world and greater tolerance both in religious and in sientific ways. The islamic world is under miltary agression and occupation by the western world, and it is all about their natural resources. No, wonder they are sensible anything religiously mocking done in the west.
Do not get me wrong. I am in no way accepting the religiously motivated death sentenses put on the danish cartoonist. In my opinion religious leaders should not have any mundane, military or political power. In the Western World we have stripped our religious leaders from it. It is not like they liked to give it up, you know. If we were led by religious demagogues, there would be no jokes about Jesus, believe me.
I always find it suspect when someone wants to define Christianity by the Inquision. A period of action which everyone agrees was wrong, but also not in conformity to Christianity. Christianity is very tolerant, if by tolerance you mean able to live side by side with without attempting force your neighbors to submit to Jesus. Christianity offers its case, you either take it or leave it. Leaving it means you are punsihed yourself for your sins, taking it means having Christ take it for you.
Jews were able to live in Islamic countries only after paying the jizya. The tax which allowed them to not have to convert or be subjected to slavery.
And you said:
“Higher education however means higher understanding of the world and greater tolerance both in religious and in sientific ways.”
You should ask a Jew what they think of this. Nazi Germany was one of the most educated countries during the WW2 era. The were intolerant of Jews to the point of consentration camps. The used them as science experiments. Don’t tell me education=tolerance.
Incidentally, I did not mention the inquisition, but since you brought it up, there you have it. Actions of a truly tolerant religion? The heretics, witches and pagans were killed for centuries in their thousands before inquisition was formed and long after the inquisition had been demolished. It was just one sad episode on that road. It was not christianity that made Western countries tolerant, it was education. Are you a tolerant christian?
If you find it suspect that people define christianity by the actions of inquisition (the organisation set by the highest authority in western church for centuries), then how do you feel about defining christianity by the crusades or by the ku klux klan? They certainly thought they defined christianity.
Higher education levels lead to greater tolerance. Germany was the best educated nation in the world before the rise of nazism. Jews formed a great part of the germans with high education. That was not counted as a benefit for them by the nazis. And alltough many high ranking nazies held phd’s the political power behind them came from the uneducated masses. Alltough some of the high ranking nazies were atheists, most of them were actually mystics. The church acted in many cases in a pro nazi way. In all the germans soldiers belt buckless it said “Got mit unz”. Now, whose god was it, that was with them? Many of them propably even believed it to be so. The whole idea of harassing the jews as a religious minority came originally from the church. Nazis were not the first to kill jews in Europe.
Of course there are wery tolerant people among the low educated just as there are wery tolerant people among jews, christians and muslims alike. It is so, that it is easier to lead people with low education to what ever end by religious fansies. This is what demagogues do and their ends are not often tolerant.