There are two very simple reasons why religious people stick with the religions they are given (more often than they turn away from them or break off to form their own versions, that is). First, in believing that the foundations of their religion are given by a God or come from some superior (but not necessarily supernatural) intelligence that these beliefs are good and reasonable and worth keeping. Additional to that, the longer such beliefs remain, the more ingrained they can become, even as they stagnate, and the more worth keeping they seem—after all, if they lasted this long, they must be working. The second reason people stick with the religions they have is something I got at in last week’s essay, the comfort of it. Like in Pam Wynn’s poem Religion, the rooms of the house (of religion) may be “heavy and dark” and the “ground on which it stands” may be “beginning to cave in,” but “once the walls were familiar, comforting.” Where there was comfort before, there is still comfort enough to want to hold to old things, be it religious beliefs or anything.[1]
This holding to old beliefs can of course put people in positions that might seem strange to us on the outside. An example of this can be found in that Economist article about the Arab women protesting in Sana’a[2]. These women, subjugated to a secondary, if not tertiary, role in life, come in their religion-demanded garb, covered from head to toe, protesting a part of the very process that has put them in such a low position. They don’t do this because of potential reprisal if they were to take the opposite side, though that certainly could be an issue on some level. They do this because child marriage, whatever we outsiders might argue the negative aspects are, is a part of the system in which these women have become who they have become. This is a system that, as far as they know or at least believe, has come from God. To think otherwise, or to even question the rightness of this or any other part of the system, would put them in opposition to a system of belief that touches at the heart of their very being. Wynn’s house may be old and cramped, but it is still her house, the place where she lives, the place where she has lived every day since she was taught or sought religion.
Stepping away from a religion that subjugated you to a lesser role, that demands you cover yourself from head to toe, that you not speak to a man who is not your father or your husband—this would seem somewhat easy. If a system puts you down, the natural response, logically, is to get away from such a system. But, then the comfort aspect comes back into play, for, if you step away from the belief system that has been with you all your life, that was with your father and your mother and your grandparents and their parents and back for many a generation, where do you go? Life requires a certain sense of control, of order, or the day-to-day existence would be far too overwhelming. Sometimes you need the water in the pail, the moon in the water, right where you want and expect them to be. Sudden realization, like that of the nun Chiyono,[3] cannot work for everyone. Sometimes the sudden is simply scary for being so sudden, not a welcome break from a harsh reality, but a distraction from a comforting one.
Ludwig Wittgenstein used a “family resemblance” group of traits to define religion[4], the idea being that the more of these traits are present, the more comfortable we are defining a given system as a religion. The list is composed almost entirely of traits that would be comforting to a follower of a given religion. A moral code puts everything in order, makes life easier to live without the chaos. Similarly, prayer and ritual put a person in direct practical (meaning here, related to active practice, not necessarily useful) connection with their beliefs, making the ephemeral seem very real. A supernatural or superior intelligent being that drives a religious foundation puts all the rules, the order in the hands of someone better than us, someone who must have known more than we know and who knew how to make things work, how to keep life livable. Revealed truth and a deep intense concern—these put a certain import on belief, make it seem, even if its foundation may be proven false, an objective good. There are those—myself, occasionally among them—who may not believe in the godliness of Jesus Christ (or perhaps that he was ever even a single, living individual) but who still find in his words reasonably guidance for living. The Ten Commandments may not have come from God but they still encompass the basic rules that virtually every civilization has ever put down for its basics. And, any complex worldview that establishes which historical events are important or unimportant, which ones led us to this point in history and which ones did not, any worldview that leads to the notion, spelled out or not, that this is how we are supposed to live, how we have always lived and how we should always live, is a comforting worldview… at least as long as one remains within its bounds. Stepping out of those bounds—in that there is not comfort but frightening actions leading to the unknown. Stepping out of those bounds would be like not praying “for a rainbow” as Wynn does in her poem, but leaving the house altogether to stand in the rain and get wet and not knowing if the cold and the rain will make you sick or make you free.
[1] I have a teddy bear manufactured the month I was born and gifted to my mother just before my birth, not because I require the physical comfort of a stuffed animal, or even because I necessarily have specific memories of the bear from when I was very young, but simply because I have always had the bear, and it serves as a simple constant in my life even when so much else may change, sometimes drastically, over time. For some, going to church, something they may have done every week since they can remember, is just as easily a constant regardless of any specific fondness or direct comfort a church service has ever given.
[2] Arab women’s rights: Some say they don’t want them. The Economist 27 March 2010. 53.
[3] As we read in the excerpt from Zen Flesh, Zen Bones
[4] I got this form of the list from a previous college course and cannot, for the life of me, find the original source (i.e. the one in which Wittgenstein delineated it) of this list as it appears here, but it is safe to say, that wherever it came from originally, the list makes sense for defining religions as religions. The 13 traits are as follows: 1. Belief in supernatural intelligent being(s), 2. Belief in superior intelligent being(s), 3. Complex worldview (defining significant events in history and positioning said “religion” as arising from such events, 4. Belief in experience after death, 5. A moral code, 6. A place for evil, 7. Theodicy, 8. Prayer and ritual, 9. Sacred objects and places, 10. Revealed truth, 11. Intense religious experience, 12. Deep, intense concern, and 13. Commitment to Sharing.
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