Categoria: English

Religion can make the good better and the bad worse

Leonardo Boff3 Comentários

Everything that is healthy can get sick, including religions and churches. Particularly today that we are afflicted by the disease of fundamentalism, that contaminates important sectors of virtually all religions and churches, including the Roman Catholic Church. Sometimes there is a true religious war. One need only follow some religious programs, especially those on television of a neo-Pentecostal tendency, but also some conservative sectors of the Roman Catholic Church, in order to hear how they condemn people or groups of certain theological tendencies, or demonize the Afro-Brazilian religions.

The main expression of this war-like and exterminating fundamentalism is the Islamic State, ISIS, that turns violence and the murder of those who are different into expressions of their identity.

But there is also another religious vice, found in the mass media, especially on radio and television: the use of religion to recruit people, to preach the gospel of material prosperity, to extract money from the faithful to enrich their pastors and their self proclaimed bishops. We have to deal with commercial religions that obey the logic of the market, namely, competition and recruitment of the greatest possible number of people, with the greatest possible accumulation of cash.

If we look carefully, the majority of these mass media churches rarely mention the New Testament. The Old Testament predominates. This is understandable. In the Old Testament, except in the Prophets and other texts, material well being is emphasized as an expression of divine pleasure. Wealth holds centrality. The New Testament exalts the poor, preaches mercy, forgiveness, love for one’s enemy and boundless solidarity with the poor and the downtrodden. Where does one hear, even in Roman Catholic radio and TV programs, the words of the Master: “Blessed you poor, because yours is the kingdom of God”?

There is too much talk of Jesus and God as if they were something found in the market. By their nature, these sacred realities demand reverence and devotion, respectful silence and devout unction. The most prevalent sin is against the Second Commandment: “Do not take the holy name of God in vain”. That name is affixed on car windows and even found in people’s wallets, as if God were not everywhere. And having Jesus this and Jesus that in an irritating trivialization of the sacred.

What is even more painful and truly scandalous is that the names of God and of Jesus are invoked for purely commercial ends. Or worse, they are used to cover up embezzlements, the theft of public funds and money laundering. Someone has an enterprise whose title is “Jesus”. In the name of “Jesus” millions are amassed in bribes, hidden in foreign banks, and other forms of corruption occur involving public goods. And this is done with absolute shamelessness.

If Jesus were among us, without a doubt He would do what He did with the merchants of the temple: He took a whip and chased them away, trashing their money bags.

Due to these distortions of the sacred reality, we lose the humanizing inheritance of the Judeo-Christian Scriptures, particularly of the liberating and humane character of the message and practice of Jesus of Nazareth. Religion can make the good better, but it can also make the bad worse.

We know that it was not Jesus’ original intention to create a new religion. There were many religions at the time. Nor did He contemplate reforming Judaism. What He wanted was to teach us to live our lives guided by the values of his main dream, the kingdom of God, comprised of unconditional love, mercy, forgiveness and total surrender to a God, called “Father”, (Abba in Hebrew), with characteristics of a mother of boundless goodness. He set in motion the creation of the new man and new woman, humanity’s eternal search.

As the book Acts of the Apostles show, initially Christianity was a movement more than an institution. It was called “the way of Jesus”, where reality was open to the fundamental values Jesus of Nazareth preached and lived. But as the movement grew, it was inevitably converted into an institution, with rules, rites and doctrines. And then the sacred power (sacra potestas) became the organizing principle of the whole institution, now called Church. The character of the movement was absorbed by the Church. Through history we know, however, that where power prevails, love disappears and mercy vanishes. Sadly, that is what happened. Thomas Hobbes warned that power protects itself only by seeking more and more power.

And this is how Churches appeared that were powerful by virtue of institutions, monuments, material wealth and even banks. And with power comes the possibility of corruption.

We are witnessing something good that we must welcome: Pope Francis is retaking Christianity for us, more as a movement than as an institution, more like an encounter between people and the living Christ, and more as mercy without limits than discipline and orthodox doctrine. He has placed Jesus, the person, at the center, rather than power, dogma, or the moral framework. This allows everyone, even those who are not part of the institution, to feel that, to the degree that they opt for love and justice, they are on the path of Jesus.
Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Religion can make the good better and the bad worse

Leonardo Boff2 Comentários

Everything that is healthy can get sick, including religions and churches. Particularly today that we are afflicted by the disease of fundamentalism, that contaminates important sectors of virtually all religions and churches, including the Roman Catholic Church. Sometimes there is a true religious war. One need only follow some religious programs, especially those on television of a neo-Pentecostal tendency, but also some conservative sectors of the Roman Catholic Church, in order to hear how they condemn people or groups of certain theological tendencies, or demonize the Afro-Brazilian religions.

The main expression of this war-like and exterminating fundamentalism is the Islamic State, ISIS, that turns violence and the murder of those who are different into expressions of their identity.

But there is also another religious vice, found in the mass media, especially on radio and television: the use of religion to recruit people, to preach the gospel of material prosperity, to extract money from the faithful to enrich their pastors and their self proclaimed bishops. We have to deal with commercial religions that obey the logic of the market, namely, competition and recruitment of the greatest possible number of people, with the greatest possible accumulation of cash.

If we look carefully, the majority of these mass media churches rarely mention the New Testament. The Old Testament predominates. This is understandable. In the Old Testament, except in the Prophets and other texts, material well being is emphasized as an expression of divine pleasure. Wealth holds centrality. The New Testament exalts the poor, preaches mercy, forgiveness, love for one’s enemy and boundless solidarity with the poor and the downtrodden. Where does one hear, even in Roman Catholic radio and TV programs, the words of the Master: “Blessed you poor, because yours is the kingdom of God”?

There is too much talk of Jesus and God as if they were something found in the market. By their nature, these sacred realities demand reverence and devotion, respectful silence and devout unction. The most prevalent sin is against the Second Commandment: “Do not take the holy name of God in vain”. That name is affixed on car windows and even found in people’s wallets, as if God were not everywhere. And having Jesus this and Jesus that in an irritating trivialization of the sacred.

What is even more painful and truly scandalous is that the names of God and of Jesus are invoked for purely commercial ends. Or worse, they are used to cover up embezzlements, the theft of public funds and money laundering. Someone has an enterprise whose title is “Jesus”. In the name of “Jesus” millions are amassed in bribes, hidden in foreign banks, and other forms of corruption occur involving public goods. And this is done with absolute shamelessness.

If Jesus were among us, without a doubt He would do what He did with the merchants of the temple: He took a whip and chased them away, trashing their money bags.

Due to these distortions of the sacred reality, we lose the humanizing inheritance of the Judeo-Christian Scriptures, particularly of the liberating and humane character of the message and practice of Jesus of Nazareth. Religion can make the good better, but it can also make the bad worse.

We know that it was not Jesus’ original intention to create a new religion. There were many religions at the time. Nor did He contemplate reforming Judaism. What He wanted was to teach us to live our lives guided by the values of his main dream, the kingdom of God, comprised of unconditional love, mercy, forgiveness and total surrender to a God, called “Father”, (Abba in Hebrew), with characteristics of a mother of boundless goodness. He set in motion the creation of the new man and new woman, humanity’s eternal search.

As the book Acts of the Apostles show, initially Christianity was a movement more than an institution. It was called “the way of Jesus”, where reality was open to the fundamental values Jesus of Nazareth preached and lived. But as the movement grew, it was inevitably converted into an institution, with rules, rites and doctrines. And then the sacred power (sacra potestas) became the organizing principle of the whole institution, now called Church. The character of the movement was absorbed by the Church. Through history we know, however, that where power prevails, love disappears and mercy vanishes. Sadly, that is what happened. Thomas Hobbes warned that power protects itself only by seeking more and more power.

And this is how Churches appeared that were powerful by virtue of institutions, monuments, material wealth and even banks. And with power comes the possibility of corruption.

We are witnessing something good that we must welcome: Pope Francis is retaking Christianity for us, more as a movement than as an institution, more like an encounter between people and the living Christ, and more as mercy without limits than discipline and orthodox doctrine. He has placed Jesus, the person, at the center, rather than power, dogma, or the moral framework. This allows everyone, even those who are not part of the institution, to feel that, to the degree that they opt for love and justice, they are on the path of Jesus.

Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Aylan Kurdi, the drowned little boy, makes us cry and think

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

The Syrian little boy of 3 or 4 years, lies drowned on the beach, pale and still dressed in his little boy’s clothes. Face down and with the face turned to one side, as if he would want to still breath. The waves had pity on him and carried him to the beach. The fish, always voracious, respected him because they also had pity of his innocense. Aylan Kurdi is his name. His father could not keep hold of them and they escaped of his hand; and the boys were swallowed by the waters. .

Dear Aylan: you were flying from the horrors of war in Syria, where the troops of President Assad, backed by the rich Arab Emirates, fight against soldiers of the cruel Islamic State, that beheads all those who do not convert to their religion, sadly supported by Western forces of Europe and the United States. I imagine that you were scared by the sound of the supersonic planes that launch murderous bombs. You did not sleep by the fear that your house would fly in flames through the airs.

How many times you would have heard your parents and neighbors say how dreadful are the planes that fly without a pilot, the drones. The drones persecute and chase human beings through the arid hills, and kills them. Wedding festivities, celebrated with great happiness, in spite of all the horror, are also bombed, because it is supposed that there must be a terrorist among the guests.

Perhaps you do not imagine that who practices such barbarity and who is behind all this is a young soldier, who lives in a military barrack in Texas. He is peacefully sitting in his living room in front of an immense TV screen. Through satellite the screen shows the battle fields of your country, Syria, or Iraq. When the young soldier suspects, with a simple touch of a bottom fires a weapon held by the drone. The young soldier feels nothing. Hears nothing. He does not even has pain. On the other side, thousands of kilometers away, 30 or 40 human beings, children as yourself, fathers and mothers like your father and mother, persons who have nothing to do with the war, suddenly die. They are coldly murdered. From the other side, the young soldier smiles because he had hit the target.

Due to the terror that comes from skies and land, facing the dread of being killed or beheaded, your parents resolved to flee. They took all the family. They do no think of looking for a job. They only want neither to die nor to be killed. They dream of living in a country where they are no longer scared, a place where they can sleep without having nightmares.

And you, dear Aylan, could happily play in the street with little playmates whose language you do not understand but that you do not need, because you the children have a language that all boys and girls understand.

You, Aylan, have not been able to reach a place of peace. But now, in spite of all the sadness we feel, we know that you, so innocent, have arrived to a paradise where you can at last play, jump and run everywhere in the company of a God that was also a child, of name Jesus, and who, not to leave you alone, has become once a gain a child. And he will play soccer with you, he will grab a little cat by the neck, run after after a little dog; you will understand each other so well, as if you had been friends forever; together you will do colored drawings, will laugh at the dolls you will make and share beautiful stories with each other. And you will feel very happy. And see, what a surprise: with you there will be your little brother who also died, and your mother will be able to embrace and kiss you, as she did so many times.

You have not died, my dear Aylan. You have gone to live and to play in another place, a much better place. The world was not worth your innocence.

And now let me think with myself. What world is this that frightens and kills the children? Why the majority of the countries do not want to receive refugees from terror and war? Are not these refugees our brothers and sisters who live in the same Common Home, the Earth? Those refugees ask for nothing. They only want to live. They want to be able to have some peace and not to see their children crying scared and jumping out of bed with the thunder of the bombs. They are human beings who want to be welcome as human beings, without threatening nobody. They only want to live their manner of venerating God and to be clothed the way they have always clothed.

Have not been enough two thousand years of Christianity to make the Europeans minimally human, solidarians and hospitable? Aylan, the little Syrian dead on the beach is a metaphor of the Europe of today: prostrated, lifeless, incapable of crying and of welcoming threatened lives. Had the Europeans not heard so many times that who welcomes the stranger or the persecuted is anonymously hosting God?

Dear Aylan, that your image thrown on the beach elicits in us some of the humanity that always stays in us, a thread of solidarity, a tear of compassion that we cannot contain in our eyes tired of seeing so much useless suffering, especially of children, like yourself. Help us, we beg you, because if not the divine flame that trembles inside us, can extinguish. And if that flame is extinguished, we all will drawn, because without love and compassion nothing will make sense in this world.

*Leonardo Boff, a Grandfather of a distant country that has already received many persons from your country, Syria, who took pity when he saw your image on the beach and painful tears of compassion escaped from his eyes.

Free translation from the Spanish sent by
Melina Alfaro, alfaro_melina@yahoo.com.ar,
done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.

Hospitality: everyone’s right and everyone’s duty

Leonardo BoffDeixe um comentário

As always, the global refugee problem presents an ethical imperative of hospitality at both the national and international levels. We are witnessing a human migration much as occurred during the decay of the Roman Empire. Millions of people seek new homelands so as to survive, or simply to escape the wars and to find a modicum of peace. Hospitality is the right of all and the duty of all. Immanuel Kant, (1724-1804), clearly saw that the interdependence between the rights and duties and hospitality, were necessary in order to construct what he called “perpetual peace” (Zum ewigen Frieden, 1795; see Jacob Ginsburg, Perpetual Peace, La paz perpetua, 2004). Anticipating its time, Kant proposed a world republic (Weltrepublik), or a Country of the Peoples (Völkerstaat), founded on the rights of the world citizenry (Weltbürgerrecht). This, says Kant, is the first task of “general hospitality” (allgemeine Hospitalität: § 357).

Why hospitality? Kant himself says «because all human beings are on planet Earth and all, without exception, have the right to be on her and to visit her places and the peoples that inhabit her. The Earth belongs to all, in community» (§ 358).

This citizenry, created by general hospitality is governed by rights, and never by violence. Kant proposes dismantling all the machinery of war and abolishing all the armies, just as the Earth Charter does now. Because as long as such means of violence exist, there will be threats by the strong against the weak, and tensions between Countries, undermining the bases for a lasting peace.

The imperative of a state of rights and the spread of generalized hospitality should create a culture of rights that penetrated the minds and hearts of all the global citizens, creating a “community of the peoples” (Gemeinschaft der Völker). This community of the peoples, affirms Kant, can grow to the extent that there is an awareness that a violation of law in one place will be felt everywhere (§ 360), something that Che Guevara would later repeat of his own accord. The spirit of hospitality and solidarity, is such that the suffering of one is the suffering of all, and the advances of one are the advances of all. It is echoed by Pope Francis, who speaks of humans as beings of relationships, who participate in the suffering of others.

If we want a lasting peace, and not just a truce or a momentary pacification, we must live universal hospitality and respect for universal rights.

Peace, according to Kant, results from the prevalence of the law, from legally ordained cooperation, and from institutionalizing cooperation among Countries and peoples. For Kant, rights are “the apple of God’s eye” or “God’s most sacred gift to Earth”. Respect for rights allows for a community of peace that puts a definitive end to “the infamous war making”.

In our times, it has been Jacques Derrida, (1930-2004), who, with his book, Of Hospitality, (De l’hospitalité, Paris, 1977), has taken up the subject of hospitality giving it an unconditional character for everyone.

Nevertheless, it was Kant who gave it the best foundation. His basis is good will, that to him, is the only virtue that has no defects. In his book, Grounding for the Metaphysics of Morals, (Fundamentación para una metafísica de las costumbres) (1785), Kant makes a very important declaration: «One cannot think of anything, in any part of the world or even outside of the world, that without reservation can be considered to be as good as good will (der gute Wille)». Translating his difficult language: good will is the only good that is good in itself and which has no limitations. Good will is good, or it is not good will. If there is suspicion in the good will, then it is not good. Good will presupposes an opening to the other and unconditional trust. This is feasible for human beings. If we do not undertake good will in earnest, we will not find a way out of the desperate social crises that tear up the societies on the periphery, and causes the millions of refugees that are headed for Europe.

Good will is the last life boat that is left. The world situation is a disaster. We are living in a permanent state of siege or global civil war. No one, not even the two Holy Men, Pope Francis and the Dali Lama; not the intellectual or moral elites, nor techno-science, offers any clues for a global path. In fact, we depend solely on our good will. It is worth remembering what Dostoyevski wrote in his 1877 fantastic short story, The Dream of a Ridiculous Man, (El sueño de un hombre ridículo): «If everyone really wanted it, everything on Earth would change in an instant».

Brazil reflects in miniature the drama of the world. The social wound produced by five hundred years of neglecting the issues of the people has resulted in a bloodletting. The majority of our elites never thought about a solution for Brazil as a whole, but only for themselves. The elites are more concerned with defending their own privileges than in guaranteeing rights for all. Through thousands of political maneuverings, even threats of impeachment, they have managed to manipulate the democratically elected governments to adopt the agenda of their interests, and to avoid or slow down the necessary social changes. In contrast to the majority of the Brazilian people, who show immense good will, the greater part of the Brazilian elites refuse to pay the debt of good will that they owe the country.

Since good will is so decisive, it is urgent that it be summonsed in everyone. Everyone bears the responsibility of hospitality, and everyone has the right to be hosted, because we live in the one and only Common Home.

Free translation from the Spanish by
Servicios Koinonia, http://www.servicioskoinonia.org.
Done at REFUGIO DEL RIO GRANDE, Texas, EE.UU.