I think most people can
understand the pain of losing a close friend or family member to drug
addiction, but a less understood pain is the loss of someone to extremist,
cultlike religion.
To be clear, I'm not saying one
is "worse" than the other. Drug addiction is certainly more dangerous
to physical health and is more likely to land people in legal trouble, but
religious fundamentalism can also be deeply harmful. It erodes at
individuality, curiosity, creativity, and compassion. It replaces a fully
realized human being with a set of prepackaged values intent on conquering all
other worldviews. Essentially, it's a virus that masquerades as a cure. I don't
believe that religion itself is a virus. It can be practiced in a healthy way.
But fundamentalism is never healthy, either to oneself or to others. It also
seems to have more social support than narcotic addiction because it comes with
the veneer of a moral high ground--not only a sense of superiority over those
who are not religious, but also over those who are spiritual but not obsessive about
it.
I have watched as unique,
brilliant, funny, completely benevolent people have succumbed to drug addiction
and religious extremism alike. It's heartbreaking in both situations. A
cherished old friend of mine now believes I'm going to hell because I don't
think you have to be Christian to be a good person, nor do I believe that
non-Christians are damned, and because I am bi. It's so chilling to look at
someone you used to know so well and see that they no longer recognize you, and
vice versa. To know they sincerely believe you are destined for a place of
neverending torment and that you will deserve every moment of it because you're
not straight and you don't share their beliefs. Yet they tell you in the same
breath that they "love" you. How can you love somebody if you believe
that the ultimate judge of the highest good has already deemed them worthless?
If you think they deserve to be tortured? I'm not only disturbed on my own
behalf, but also on account of the way they're treating other people. The
constant proselytizing, the vandalism of others' sacred spaces with fire and
brimstone. The way they behave toward the LGBT community. I have always found
the idea of anybody ever being designated to hell to be abhorrent, and reject
it because it could not coexist with any kind of goodness in the world.
Hopefully they will come around
eventually. Hopefully their emotional and intellectual immune system will fight
off this virus and they'll be back to themselves someday. This is my most
urgent wish right now. There are few things as painful as watching a beautiful
person deliberately suffocate everything that makes them who they are.
