Slightly Unhinged

Charles Karel Bouley: The Majority of Muslims Who Attend Mosque Weekly Feel Torturing For Their Cause Is Just**

I love this piece by Charles Karel Bouley in the Huffington Post about the recent Pew Forum study on the correlation between religiosity and support of torture.  I’ve never considered myself a religious person but I do have more than a passing familiarity with the Bible, having put in some time both in Catholic school and Protestant Sunday School, and it has always struck me as incongruous that it is very often the people who are the most vocal about their religious beliefs who are the most righteously judgmental about the morals of others.   While I don’t subscribe to any particular religious belief (if pressed to categorize myself, I suppose I’d call myself a secular humanist with an interest in Buddhism), I do have a strong value system and try my best to live according to these values.  My moral code is pretty simple: treat others as you’d like to be treated and be a good person who does what you can to help others and make the world a better place.  In my eyes, torture is an immoral act – plain and simple.  The fact that people who call themselves Christians and rail about the perceived decline of moral values in the United States could justify the use of torture is mind-boggling to me.  I believe that Christian conservatives have lost their moral compass and strayed dangerously far from the basic tenets of their religion.  They are using religion as a justification for an agenda that is often homophobic, racist, and misogynistic.  I think Jesus would be appalled at the course many of his followers have chosen and what they are doing in his name.  We need to call them on their hypocrisy every chance we get.