Some religious pastors are suggesting that inter-faith dialogue could result in better understanding and, hence, a decrease in violence among the various religions. In order to overcome the faith divide, the religious (and the non-believer) would have to throw a core function of religion overboard: the exclusion mechanism of one truth against another. Interestingly, every religion claims that it is the lone exception to that rule and trailblazers of any color offer a path to dialogue.

 

How short in breath these offers are can be experimented easily by telling any American Christian that Jesus is NOT God. It is the fastest way to get the Western Christian blood boiling. Likewise, the highly contentious belief that the Koran is a work of fraud is widespread in America. Test any Muslim. While an odd zeitgeist forbids criticism of the Jewish narrative, one’s own truth is the word of God, of course.

 

Exclusion is in the nature of religious truths, not meaningful dialogue or, heaven forbid, an honest investigation of the foundation of the religions or their fabricated histories, except for the true one. Inviting the most unwelcome participants, atheists, to the table would complicate matters even more, exposing the dialogue to insults of delusion. Those anti-God fundamentalists tend to summarily view religious minds as extremists and potential terrorists.

 

But then why is there an offer for dialogue and teaching of comparative religions? It may not have escaped the curious mind that every Judaic religion advertises itself, against all truths, as religion of peace. As the following examples show, heretics or atheists are excluded from this offer to peace.

 

 

 

 

Only believers are included in the inner circle of peace. There is no point in Western history where Judaism, Christianity, or Islam would merit adoration. Instead, the historic horrors would keep on coming. The relative peace in modern times is owed to the minority position of religious sects in secular societies. Should opportunity present itself, the inherent evil of religion will inevitably return, as a peek into the Muslim Middle East, Christian Africa, or Ultra-Orthodox Jerusalem reveals. Hence, that the flaring up of violence and intolerance rests on misunderstandings of religion may be further from reality than one might hope.

 

It seems self-evident that an inter-religious dialogue would take place under the cover of mutual silence over the unshakable historic horrors that could not be buried. As in yesteryears, any religion will again show its ugly face when opportunity presents itself. The offer for a roundtable is nothing other than an expedient attempt to create a platform for fetching new recruits from one another by highlighting the positive aspects of the modern doctrines of which there are admittedly plenty in any of the truths, should one wish to seek them out.

 

The single biggest problem of modern humanity is religion. However, it is also the greatest potential problem solver if the positive energies could be directed toward a common goal that serves humanity rather than the vested interests of religious kings. Before this would happen, Jews seize to be Jews, Christians to be Christians, and Muslims seize to be Muslims.