Are All Religions Basically the Same?

You've probably heard some form of the following sentiment: When you strip away the rites and rituals, all religions are basically the same.

It sounds nice. Polite. Inoffensive. Politically correct. But, of course, it’s dead wrong.

We evangelical Christians understand this. Our very claim that Christ is the Truth implies that Christianity is unique. But even in academia—where Christian faith is certainly not the norm—the belief that all religions are the same has been largely abandoned. Scholars of comparative religion almost unanimously agree that the world’s major religions differ in important and irreconcilable ways.

For instance, who could argue that Islam and Buddhism are essentially the same? Islam is fiercely monotheistic. Buddhism, on the other hand, has no conception of a god, except as an impersonal force. The central injunction for Muslims is obedience. The goal for Buddhists is enlightenment. Then there’s Christianity. The doctrine of grace—which is central to Christian faith—has no parallel in any other system of belief. Once you start examining religions closely, the differences come to light fairly quickly. In his classic book Christianity and World Religion Norman Anderson writes, “Even the most cursory examination of the theology of different religions reveals far more contradiction than consensus.”

Given the sharp contrasts between religions, I’m always amazed to hear people opine confidently that they are really all the same. Even such comments as “all paths lead to God” strike me as bizarre. How can all paths lead to God when all of those paths define God in radically different ways and some paths don’t even believe in Him!

The tendency to lump all religions together is often what causes people to balk at the exclusive claims of the Christian faith. If all religions are basically the same, why embrace Christianity? Perhaps we need to draw attention to the fact that religions actually differ dramatically and carefully delineate our faith’s unique beliefs. At least then people will not dismiss Christ as just one face in a pantheon of homogenous deities. Understanding the differences, they will see the need to make a choice.

The End of Spanking?

Spanking is so passé. At least the Council of Europe (a 47-country body that promotes civil liberties) hopes it will be soon.

The group has launched a campaign to abolish parental “smacking” the world over by 2009. That’s quite an ambitious goal, and, it seems to me, a strange one. Whatever your views on spanking, wouldn’t it be better to use a concerted, international movement to target child sex traffickers before setting your sites on parents who favor corporal discipline?

A recent article “Spare the Rod, Say Some” from The Economist heralded the campaign and the proliferation of anti-spanking laws across the pond as evidence that spanking is headed for the history books.

“A consensus against hitting children is clearly gathering momentum in the developed, law-governed parts of the world. Also growing is the belief that a light parental cuff and serious forms of child abuse are points, albeit quite far apart, on the same spectrum. Some parents may still insist that their right to dissuade a toddler from doing very dangerous things is also worth protecting; but they are losing the argument.”

As the article repeatedly points out, soon the only wealthy country where parents will be permitted to spank will be the United States, which the writer portrays as the last backward bastion for practitioners of the barbaric practice.

At the risk of offending European progressives, I’d like to put in my vote for keeping spanking legal. I think it’s just gotten a bad rap. Maybe I believe in spanking because I myself was spanked as a child. My father always did it in love and never in anger, which I think is the key for defending the embattled discipline.

Most of the arguments against spanking turn out to be straw man fallacies. They lump all manner of physical abuse—cuffing, slapping, shaking and battering—in with the practice and then attack it. But of course, any honest treatment of the subject will differentiate between cruel mistreatment and loving, restorative physical discipline. Christians who believe in spanking as a legitimate form of punishment should make the distinction clear. After all, the same Scriptures that instruct us not to “spare the rod” also command us to love our children and to not “exasperate” them.

The Economist may be right. The tide may turn on spanking, even in the United States. But wherever the practice is still lovingly carried out, I believe children will be better for it.

Chapman Family Update

Last week I wrote about the tragic death of Steven Curtis Chapman's five-year-old daughter, Maria Sue. For those of you praying for the family I wanted to provide this update. It's from a close friend of the Chapman family. Keep praying for them. I know our prayers have made a difference.

"Everyone wants to know...how are they doing? I understand the question. So many care so deeply, so many can't imagine this loss. But the question is unanswerable, really. I think Caleb did it best when he said at the visitation and at the funeral that the best term he can find is 'confused' ... Read the Rest of the update