... we don't hear a lot about sane people of faith, and a lot of us probably don't understand them very well.
Dare I say, without sounding prejudiced (and I'm not), that it is in fact an American thing. I live in a country that is 98% Catholic and our religion is a big part of our culture. However, we have almost no fundamentalists, even more devoted Catholics don't take every word of the Bible at face value and we're not as burdened with our religion as some Catholics over there seem to be.
I have been thinking a lot about the matter, actually, and perhaps it's the fact America is so multicultural and multi-religious (I know it's not a word, but you get my drift) that there's this need for people to go to extremes in their faith as they are daily confronted with groups of different beliefs. I just know that when I first realized a few years back how Catholicism is viewed over there, what Catholics are believed to be, it left me shocked. Especially the fact that most of the things were true. It is unknown here.
no subject
Dare I say, without sounding prejudiced (and I'm not), that it is in fact an American thing. I live in a country that is 98% Catholic and our religion is a big part of our culture. However, we have almost no fundamentalists, even more devoted Catholics don't take every word of the Bible at face value and we're not as burdened with our religion as some Catholics over there seem to be.
I have been thinking a lot about the matter, actually, and perhaps it's the fact America is so multicultural and multi-religious (I know it's not a word, but you get my drift) that there's this need for people to go to extremes in their faith as they are daily confronted with groups of different beliefs. I just know that when I first realized a few years back how Catholicism is viewed over there, what Catholics are believed to be, it left me shocked. Especially the fact that most of the things were true. It is unknown here.
/rant
I apologize for the lack of brevity. :)