• Many people become sectarians, bigots, fanatics mostly because they do not know the context of their culture and / or religion. In order to be able to better assess the quality of your culture and religion, you need to know its context. But many people do not even try to do it. They are often mistaken in the belief that their faith is the best. They assess themselves, their country, their culture, their religion, their worldview, in isolation from others and not in the context of others. The film “The Story of God” made by Morgan Freeman and film “Legacy” made by Michael Wood are very helpful in this area.
• Many religions are hermetic institutions, closed and unfriendly to others. That is why the ecumenical movement has been making such poor progress for many years. Ecumenical meetings and prayers turn out to be ineffective. No wonder. The Catholic Church considers itself to be the guardian of the one and only truth. In the Catechism of the Catholic Church you can read the following:
“The Catholic Church recognizes in other religions that search, among shadows and images, for the God who is unknown… the New Testament Scriptures tell us the ultimate truth of God’s revelation… There is no salvation outside the Church. All salvation comes only from Christ who is his body… He is the eternal word of the Father; there will be no other revelation after Him.”
Let me remind you what I wrote earlier:
– In order to abolish faith in the existence of any god, you have to refute hundreds, if not thousands, of his various definitions. Also, in order to defend the definition of your own god as the only true one, you have to refute hundreds, if not thousands, of other definitions. So the best position is indirect, the assumption that there are many different gods. Other gods should at least be tolerated if they are unknown, and not criticized.
In any case, we must reject such lessons of catechism and change the approach to other religions and cultures. Otherwise, prejudices, antaganisms, struggles and even religious wars will never end in this world.