And ...
Interesting comments on yesterday's entry. One in particular gave me some thinking to do, the one about Jehovah's Witnesses not pledging or standing. I admire a greal deal about Jehovah's Witnesses, and I knew their beliefs prohibited them from pledging, which I have no problems with, of course, as I said yesterday. I still don't get the no standing thing, though.
Here's the ultimate question: when one religious belief conflicts with others, and the people are trying to co-exist, how do you decide which one gets precedence; in effect, which person gets to offend the other person? Now, I realize in this case, the pledge is not a religious thing, but it is an important part of many people's belief system. If they are offended by someone not standing in their midst, again, who gets to have the dominant beliefs?
I'll give you a different hypothetical, one that is a big issue for lots of people: abortion. In my spiritual view -- and this is spiritual, not political -- a fetus is not a human life in the sense that a living person is. Abortion is a personal decision, as far as I'm concerned, and people who choose to have them, I think, do not think of fetuses as human beings. There are many others whose religious beliefs are different, and who believe that fetuses are human being from conception, and therefore abortion is wrong. I support their right to have these beliefs, of course, and these people should not have abortions. Should one set of beliefs dominate over the other? I don't know, I'm asking, not answering. And this is a much more serious issue than standing or sitting for the pledge of allegiance.
Here's another one. Certain religions forbid eating certain foods. If a member of one of these groups is living as a minority of one among people of different religions, should that one person be forced to eat the food the others are eating, even it violates their beliefs? What if there are no other foods available?
Again, these are questions, not answers. I'm reading an interesting book at the moment -- see below -- that addresses a variety of questions raised by religious faith. So I'm more off the wall than usual.
I got my hair cut today, and saw a doctor to get meds for a sinus infection. It was my doctor's day off, so I got to meet the other internist in the group, who was very nice. Tomorrow, essentially my last day of vacation *sob*, I'm getting some blood work done and then going to the nutritionist. So there ya go.
WATCHING MSNBC :: ENTRY #1844
SUMMER BOOK #8: The Year of Living Biblically by A.J. Jacobs
For me, all those decisions should be left up to the person they directly affect... for example, abortion. No matter what I think about it, it's not up to me unless it's my pregnancy. And I believe that people who decide to have them pay the consequences for their decision one way or the other. It's not up to me to judge or condemn.....
ReplyDeleteThere's a whole lot of heavy thinking going on here. I think you raise some very valid points, especially the one about "who gets to do the offending." My personal view is much like Beanie's -- it should be up to the person who is most affected. But then how do I reconcile that with a Jehovah's Witness not standing during the Pledge? I don't know. I think sometimes you do what everyone else is doing because that's the respectful thing to do, but there is nothing wrong with educating people about why you may or may not agree with something.
ReplyDeleteI'm just thankful we live in a country where we can have these differing viewpoints without any kind of serious repercussions.
well, i'll tackle the abortion question. i'll have to disagree with you and tell you that in my belief, human life begins at conception, and in my belief, a fetus is most definately a human being, albeit in its most undevelouped form, nonetheless, still human. however, in my belief, a woman has the god given right to choose wether or not to carry that baby to birth, but it is not the government's responsibility to decide for her. i dont like the idea of abortion, but if a woman wants to, who am i or anyone else to tell that woman not to? her body, her life, her choice.
ReplyDeletewhen a group of people recite the pledge of alligence, the group as a whole should stand and recite it with hand over heart. the flag of the united states of america represents the united states of america, and when we say "i pledge alligence to the flag of the united states of america" what we are saying that we pledge alligence to the united states of america, and the flag in this essence is a symbol of the country as a whole, one nation under god. even though there is no set law in place to command any one person or a group to say the pledge, if you are in a group that recites the pledge, you should out of respect and common courtesy recite it also. this notion that it is against "religious beliefs" is just plain hogwash.
There's one abortion question that I never hear anyone ask: How does the mother of several children weigh the welfare of all her living children against that of the one additional child she is carrying? Particularly if she's just barely managing as is.
ReplyDeleteThe Talmud says that if survival is in question, one may eat some sort of treif. That doesn't mean you do it because you'll go hungry today, but if the following days have just more of the same. However, several rabbis in concentration camps said that if God meant them to survive, they would survive. So these rabbis simply refused to eat anything questionable (like milk that might have come from an "unclean" animal like a horse).