Let’s look into our own religions and surroundings.As one belonging to the Christian faith, I like to invite the faithful and leaders of all four religions in Sri Lanka, to go deeper into their own faiths, not only to identify and weakness for evil to thrive even within the sanctum of their religions and weed out those evils but also to fight against these evils present outside the walls of religions in our societies.
How did these religions appear on earth?
In looking within our own religions let us first weed out our misunderstanding about religion. No religion, as religion, if formulated and founded by God, remains a nameless, formless, super-human power (Albert Einstein) behind all the wonders of creation we see and explore. But to man, helplessly wondering and searching for the power beyond, God has revealed himself to all mankind in various ways and in various times. These revelations to mankind have given birth to various religions among all people originating from all corners of the earth. No religion can claim exclusivity of any kind.
All religions have taken their origins from some form of revelation and been built up by men with formulas of faith, rituals and morals. All religions have grown among men to help man recognize his nature and end and to help him struggle against the forces of evil death and live a normal good life. In short, religions are at the service of men, not vice versa.
Christianity proclaims and celebrates Easter
My own religion is one of these taking its origin in God’s relevance to the Israelites in their history where Jesus born a Jew, reveals himself as the Messiah or Redeemer of Humanity, announces the coming of God’s Kingdom, suffers death in the hands of the Jewish and Roman Authorities, and rises from death as Risen Christ, Establishing victory over sin and death.
It is this faith in Risen Christ conquering sin and death that we celebrate on Easter Sunday.
All religions struggle against evil hoping in the victory of good.
Though religions started from divine revelations, yet the growth and formation of these religions are mostly the work of man, who believes and guided by super-natural divine or superhuman forces but remaining subject to evil forces of the world. Followers of all religions undertake a continuous struggle believing in the ultimate victory of good against the evil forces of sin in this world. Hence the commonality of all religions to struggle against surrounding evil forces believing and hoping in the triumph and liberation of the good.
In Sri Lanka, we have Adam’s Peak, visited by followers of all four religions, and claiming to recognize the feet of the Buddha, Siva, Mohamed and Adam. Prof. Hans Kueng of Tubingen, a world-renowned theologian, in studying the religions of the world, has opened his film with a scene at Adam’s Peak pointing out the potentialities for common understanding among religions. Sri Lankans, after a long period of ethnic conflict and civil war, are struggling to rebuild Sri Lanka, multi-ethnic multi-religious communities, a united island of peaceful coexistence for all.
Though politicians and governments make blunders in handling our situation and not all cooperating with those inside and outside the country to rebuilding, true followers and leaders of all religions must respond to the wake-up call on Easter Sunday.
Do not allow any room for evil to their even within the walls of your religion.Within a man-made religion, it is natural for humans to descend into extremism and fundamentalism which ignites hate and anger against other faiths.
In combating evil forces in our society, do not stop with mere armchair condemnations, but come out of your religious houses, join hands with other civic and political leaders to cry halt to evil. More harm is done by the passivity of good people than by the activity of evil.
