Who owns God?

http://wisdomofreligion.blogspot.com/2008/07/who-owns-god.html

Oprah did not deny other paths leading to God
Mike Ghouse, Dallas

Oprah in a live talk to her audience said that those who did not know Jesus and have never heard about him, simply cannot go to hell.

Not the Christians, but a handful of fundamentalists are ganging up to reign in on Oprah for saying that. They are branding the issue as “Oprah Denies Jesus as Sole Way to God”, instead of seeking understanding, they are stirring up the short-term raw emotions of those who are on the border line of being fundamentalists. The title should have been “Oprah did not deny other paths leading to God.” She did not deny the way to God through Jesus either.

This comes in the heels of an article I wrote two days ago seeking interfaith speakers.

Not the spiritual leaders (clergy), but the ones's who are in the business of clergy both in Islam and Christianity have hung their faiths on the words, rather than what those words stand for.

The essence of both the faiths is to create a world of co-existence and peaceful societies. Mind you it is not the religion; it is the self proclaimed few guardians of the religion who claim exclusivity to the favors of God by simply parroting his name rather than becoming what God wants us to become.

My focus in this article is Christianity and Islam. The representatives of other faiths including Bahai, Buddhist, Hindu, Jain, Jewish, Shinto, Sikh, Wicca and Zoroastrians are not vociferously claiming any private deals with God, behind our back to get a free pass from God.

The core principles Jesus taught are simply; love thy neighbor, turn the other cheek (meaning do not aggravate but mitigate the conflict), treat others as you would want to be treated and learn to forgive and accept others. Those values are not for bill boards to flaunt, they are for us to follow, following which will create heavens on the earth for every life.

God communicated the same values through Prophet Muhammad (pbuh); the noblest among you is the one who does good deeds, which is caring for the wellbeing of others. Qur’aan focused on justness in dealing with others that would lead to peaceful societies.

A few humans are prone to evil prompted by their own insecurities, if they can get the religion, any religion into their blood stream; they would be good humans as the majority of us are.

The question to those few in clergy business is: Is uttering the words of Jesus or Qur’aan the way to salvation or living the essence of what they meant earns us God’s grace?

A majority of the people believe in following the essence of religion, rituals and words are an important aspect of achieving salvation but not the end, rituals are the stepping stones. The Pew survey released in June revealed that 72% of Americans do not believe that theirs is the only path to salvation. I am rather surprised at the low score, had the sample been larger to absorb the variations and sampling errors, we probably should have received a number upwards of 90%. I bet those very same people if asked to respond to the question, were they not the guardians of the establishment, they would have been with the 72% of Americans raising the score to Nineties. The fundamentalists are not in sync with the masses, though the media have you believe it. I would like to see the media grill on both sides of the issue to explore the truth.

Although the hardcore fundamentalists in both Christian and Muslim faiths are less than 1% of the respective population, they are powerful and have cornered the faith market with fear. When people are not sure about the life after death or don’t have the time to do their own home work, they will fall for any hope giver, false or real. Take the element of fear out; in their natural element most people are respectful to all of God’s creation – other humans and the environment. That is the teaching of God through Jesus or Muhammad or any one of the spiritual masters.

To be religious is to be spiritual and to be in tune with the creation, where one feels a sense of oneness with the universe, everything belongs to one and one belongs to all. A true state of liberation and the state of conflictlessness prevails in one's heart and mind. Each one of us can aspire for that ideal and achieve a relative sense of oneness with our own short comings with relative humility.

I am urging the majority of Christians and Muslims to speak up. The truth is that the great spiritual masters including Jesus, Moses, Mohammad, Krishna, Buddha, Mahavir, Zoroaster, Bahaullah, Nanank and others taught us to be good humans to each other and co-exist peacefully. You cannot deduce anything but that from their teachings. Claiming exclusivity creates conflict and divides the people into lesser faith and exclusive faiths grouping, and that goes against the very grain of the religious teachings and breeds conflict.

As a person who does not see the difference between essence of the teachings of all religions, I would urge the few hardcore fundamentalists among Christians to consider the essence of what Jesus wanted us to be; good human beings. I am a Muslim and I believe in the essence of the teachings of Jesus, and I claim myself to be a Christian in essence without the outwardly expressions. Does any one want to deny that to me? And who would that be, God appointed human? I would like to see the appointment letter.

A Good Christian is a Good Muslim, is a Good Jew, is a good Hindu, is a good Bahai, a good Buddhist and so it goes.

As a Muslim, I would like to urge the few hardcore fundamentalists among us, the Muslims, as in other faiths, to consider God’s own words in the following verses of Qur’aan;

Qur’aan, Al-Hujurat, Surah 49:13: "O mankind! We have created you male and female, and have made you nations and tribes that ye may know one another. The noblest of you, in sight of Allah, is the best in conduct. Allah Knows and is Aware."

-Qur’aan, Al-An’ am, Surah 6:163-164 “I ask whether I should seek any god besides God--when he is the Lord of all things. All people will reap the harvest of their own deeds; no one will bear another’s burden. Ultimately, all of you will return to your Lord, and he will resolve your disputes.”

Qur’aan, At-Taghabun, Surah 64:2-4: It was God who created you; yet some of you refuse to believe, while others have faith. He is aware of all your actions. He created the heavens and the earth to manifest the truth.

He fashioned each one of you--and each one of you is beautiful. To God you will all return. He knows all that the heavens and the earth contain. He knows all that you hide and all that you reveal. He knows your deepest thoughts.

Qur’aan, Al-Inshiqaq, Surah 84:7-15: Each person will be given a book. Those who are given their books in their right hands (understanding the book correctly) will be judged leniently; and they will return to their people joyfully. But those who are given their books in their left hands (misunderstanding) will call their own destruction on themselves, and burn in the fire of hell. There are the people who have never cared for their neighbors; they thought they would never return to God. Their Lord watches all that people do.

Please refer to the beautiful Chapter (Sura Kafirun) from Qur’aan that addresses the believers in other systems in the most dignified way, putting every one on par and without putting others down.

God has assured his grace to every one who cares about his creation; life and matter, he did not say his grace is showered upon Muslims. He also says that a Muslim could marry a non-Muslim without converting the other to his faith. Prophet Muhammad emphasized that a good deed is not necessarily worshipping God every minute of the day; it is serving and caring for others that is a good deed. He cites an example of planting a seed, knowing well that when it become a mature tree it will give shade or fruit to some one else in the future.

God wants justice, fairness, balance and peace for his creation and communicates that through Qur’aan. Indeed, the Qur’aan begins addressing God, as God of the cosmos to include every one and concludes with the chapter addressing the humankind in general. There is a lot of distortion and propaganda out there to fill one with hate towards the other and take out one's own peace of mind and peace of others. God is not about that and certainly no religion is about that. It is your responsibility to find the truth and if you do, you will find the peace.

Spirituality and Arrogance are inversely proportional to each other, ideally, they are mutually exclusive elements. A true religious person appreciates the religiosity and divinity of the other as he or she accords oneself with no arrogance.We have to build bridges, mitigate conflicts and work for a world of co-existence. Honoring other traditions does not diminish divinity of one's own faith. To be religious is to see the creator in all and be peace makers and justice workers.

If we can learn to accept and respect every which way one worships the divine, then conflicts fade and solutions emerge; co-existence in harmony with life and matter. As beauty is in the eyes of the beholder, faith is in the heart of the believer. Your faith is good to you as mine is to me.

Mike Ghouse is a Speaker, Thinker and a Writer. He is president of the Foundation for Pluralism and is a frequent guest on talk radio and local television network discussing interfaith, political and civic issues. He is the founding president of World Muslim Congress with a simple theme: Good for Muslims and good for the world. His comments, news analysis and columns can be found on the Websites and Blogs listed at his personal website http://www.mikeghouse.net/. Mike is a Dallasite for nearly three decades and Carrollton is his home town. He can be reached at MikeGhouse@gmail.com For a full bio: http://www.mikeghouse.net/ProfileMikeGhouse.asp