yes, there _are_ atheists in foxholes
Apr. 4th, 2010 12:47 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
winterbadgera thoughtful article about having the courtesy to respect others' beliefs
Thanks to![[livejournal.com profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/external/lj-userinfo.gif)
vonandmoggy for posting the link.
As I said in replying to their posting of the article, I don't really know where I am yet in terms of belief, but I think that it's important to avoid the sort of cruel and dismissive discounting of someone else's beliefs that they recount. Toleration is, actually, a lot harder that I think is generally recognised. It doesn't demand that we accept other peoples' beliefs for ourselves, or even that we refrain from debating them and trying to persuade someone of our own belief. But I think it does require that we behave with civility to each other and try to refrain simply attacking someone else because they disagree with us.
I myself sometimes find that almost impossibly hard when it comes to politics, I admit. I try to maintain a separation between what I think of what a person espouses and what I think of that person, but maybe that's just an illusion of a difference. And if someone isn't prepared to meet me with the same sort of respect I'm striving to maintain for them, it makes it very hard to meet my own internal standards of courtesy. I suppose that's part of what I found impossibly difficult about being a Christian--how does one find the strength to meet anger with calm, hatred with love?
Thanks to
vonandmoggy for posting the link. As I said in replying to their posting of the article, I don't really know where I am yet in terms of belief, but I think that it's important to avoid the sort of cruel and dismissive discounting of someone else's beliefs that they recount. Toleration is, actually, a lot harder that I think is generally recognised. It doesn't demand that we accept other peoples' beliefs for ourselves, or even that we refrain from debating them and trying to persuade someone of our own belief. But I think it does require that we behave with civility to each other and try to refrain simply attacking someone else because they disagree with us.
I myself sometimes find that almost impossibly hard when it comes to politics, I admit. I try to maintain a separation between what I think of what a person espouses and what I think of that person, but maybe that's just an illusion of a difference. And if someone isn't prepared to meet me with the same sort of respect I'm striving to maintain for them, it makes it very hard to meet my own internal standards of courtesy. I suppose that's part of what I found impossibly difficult about being a Christian--how does one find the strength to meet anger with calm, hatred with love?
