Liberals and Conservatives

Yes, sure, this is a political season so, obviously, you could be excused for thinking that I'm about to talk about politics. I'm not. Let's go with religion instead.

In religion the "liberals" are the one that are ... liberal with their theology. They're not stuck in the standard stuff, remaining in the traditional views. No, they're blazing new trails. The conservatives are the ones who would say, "The old ways are the best ways." Of course, in politics that statement may or may not be true. In politics things change. But in religion should they? It seems as if a religion is valid and true, then it shouldn't really change much, should it? I mean, maybe in expression, but not in principle. Not if it's true.

Well, of course, the religious liberals have no problem pushing the barriers because they don't care if their religion is right or wrong. They care about perception. "That old view isn't very comfortable. Can we pick up a new one?" The religious conservatives may recognize that the older view may not always be the most popular, but they assume the religion is true, so the view is true.

All this to point to an interesting phenomenon. When you take any religion there will be the liberals and the conservatives. In Judaism you have the orthodox Jews and you have the reformed Jews. We can assign our labels easily here. The orthodox Jews are the conservatives and the reformed Jews are the liberals. And never the twain shall meet. So it's interesting when you get to, say, Islam and compare it to, say, Christianity. In Islam you have the "radicals," those folks who are quite certain that the right thing to do is kill infidels for the sake of their God. Says so right there in their Book. Then you have the more common variety of Muslims who aren't out to kill anyone and can't figure out what's wrong with those Muslims who do. Let's look again at our two labels. Which is which? As it turns out, the liberal Muslim is the one that is not interested in killing anyone and the conservative is the one who is carefully following the Book (because their Book is actually sacred) and is likely to be called a "radical." Of course, on the Christian side it is entirely the opposite. The liberal Christian isn't too concerned about what the Bible says and pretty much wing it while the conservative Christian is the one that wants to follow the Bible and do what it says.

So, at the end, you end up with two very different religions. The conservative Christians are commanded to love God and love their unbelieving neighbors and the conservative Muslims are commanded to love God and kill their unbelieving neighbors. And peoplel say all religions are the same.