The CNN headline says President Biden has no “easy solution” to campus unrest. I am here to help.
First, no president has it easy when addressing problems as old as religious strife in the Middle East and beyond.
In a nation that advocates separation between church and state, I should feel safe at home in America. I don’t and feel exceedingly uneasy when right-wing leaders advocate that the nation is a Christian state. True, it is that America was primarily founded by Christians, except the founders knew better than to impose faith or sectarianism on anyone.
I was raised a Christian and also converted to Catholicism. As a teen, I attended Temple Israel in Columbus, Ohio, because I wanted to better understand the Old Testament foundation. I also discovered I had at least two Jewish grandmothers in my ancestry tree.
I researched to learn when the popular religions were created.
“Judaism originated with the biblical patriarch Abraham (approx. 1800 BCE). Abraham established a covenant with God that was confirmed with the reception of the Torah (the Law including the Ten Commandments) from God through Moses to the Jewish people at Mount Sinai approximately 3,320 years ago.”
“Christianity commenced more than 2,000 years ago in Israel. Christianity began with Jesus, a Jewish man who taught disciples about a new concept of the Judaic religion. Jesus' teachings emphasized love of God and love for people.”
“Islam began in 610, following the first revelation to the prophet Muhammad at age 40. Muhammad and his followers spread the teachings of Islam throughout the Arabian Peninsula.
As part of my American brainwashing educational experience, I was instructed first in the ways of my parents. I am not too critical of the values they imposed and reinforced; however, a higher quality educational experience would have told the entire history of faiths and culture. It would have explained that religions are human inventions designed to help humanity cope. Democratic governments evolved to promote universal tolerance, including atheists and agnostics.
At some point, the light bulb emerged with the discovery of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. We can move forward if humanity begins with the UDHR and agrees to oppose any faith-based state.
Nation-states will debate and compete with economic models and forms of governance. The battles will always pit authoritarianism against democratic freedom. Sustainable economics is emerging as a new model bent on mitigating capitalism's unfairness.
I compel President Biden to appeal to pluralism: a condition or system in which two or more states, groups, principles, sources of authority, etc., coexist.
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