We Americans have often, if not always, thought of equality as normative. It's a way of thinking that largely developed as part of, or alongside, our western-euro-Christo-centric worldview.
Tonight in our Church History class, the professor introduced the A Common Word initiative, and their 2007 Open Letter to Pope Benedict. The letter, from 38 Muslim scholars, is addressed to, the Roman Pope, then the Popes/Patriarchs/Metropolitans of Constantinople, Alexandria, Antioch, Jerusalem, Armenia and Eastern Europe, then the Archbishop of Canterbury, the leaders of the Lutherans, Methodists, Baptists, Reformed Churches, the General Secretary of the World Council of Churches, and leaders of Christian Churches everywhere. It was separated by: the Pope, then the Eastern Orthodox; then the non-Chalcedonian, "Oriental" Orthodox; then the Asssyrian Church of the East; then Archbishop of Canterbury, the Lutherans, Methodists, Baptists, Reformed traditions, and all the rest. (I think it was interesting that they included the Methodists and Baptists, since they, like the rest of Protestantism, properly come out of the Reformed traditions.)
Our students noted the lack of representation of women, which is what started me on this rant. We in the US, especially in NYC, live in quite an insular world. We have these ideas about freedom and equality, and because we think ours is a more excellent way, we've decided this is the right way for the whole world to live.
News flash: The rest of the world doesn't necessarily live by our norms. In much of the world, women have no voice -- or at least, not an equal voice. We like to think about all people being inherently equal, but other traidtions and cultures emphasize the concept of role or place. When we superimpose our western worldview onto other cultures, then perhaps we come away thinking that they devalue women; my experience has been that, while the role of women may be different in different places, it's not necessarily lesser. I'm reminded of my late mother and her husband. I used to question her about why she always cooked the meals, since he was a cook by trade and was often unemployed. I wanted to know why she had to work all day and them come home and cook for him. She let me know that they had an agreement: she cooked, (which she happened to enjoy), while he had to do the dishes (which she didn't enjoy -- something about her manicures).
If all people were created equal, then men could carry children. There are innate differences between the genders, and equalizing genders has not been normalized everywhere to the extent it has been in urban American society.
Something I noticed about the letter was that it was signed by people from everywhere except Australia and Greenland. While it is true that Christianity has spread quickly and rapidly (check out the link; it's a graphic representation of the growth of world religions), it is also true that in the 20th century, Islam made some incredible headway. I don't have accurate statistics; it seems the data varies depending on whether a Christian or a Muslim researcher collected it. But we Christians don't have a monopoly on religion or truth or proselytizing, and even if there are a couple billion of us on the planet, there are about a billion Muslims. We're not exactly setting high standards, and we might want to give some thought to acknowledging that people we've considered "other" aren't so "other" after all.
It's sort of like the situation in which white Americans find themselves: all of a sudden, they're not the dominant group. They may have larger numbers, but the formerly concentrated power base has been diluted.
Anyway. Today on the way to class I was thinking about atheists. It occurs to me that I regard atheists the same way I regard anyone who's lacking in cognitive or sensory faculties. It's like they have either a resistance to or an inability to acknowledge The Divine. They say we're hardwired to believe in a power greater than ourselves. Duh... maybe there's a reason for that, like there was a reason for all the other things for which we were hardwired? And if there were no God, if we humans have really outgrown our hardwired need for God, then how is it that religions have hung around all this time?
I think religious beliefs are fairly normative, fairly universal. Where we humans fall down is that we tend to deify our religious practices, rituals,and beliefs rather than taking a collective look at ourselves, our religions' norms, and the universal truths to which they point us.
Anyway. Those are my thoughts for today. I have to start writing again.
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