Questioning the Ideas Around You: Write Every Day Challenge, Day #16

A "friend" of mine (I say "friend" because he's really just an acquaintance, but we're "friends" on facebook) posted this quote on his facebook profile the other day:

We were not born critical of existing society. There was a moment in our lives (or a month, or a year) when certain facts appeared before us, startled us, and then caused us to question beliefs that were strongly fixed in our consciousness -embedded there by years of family prejudices, orthodox schooling, imbibing of newspapers, radio, and television.  This would seem to lead to a simple conclusion: that we all have an enormous responsibility to bring to the attention of others information they do not have, which has the potential of causing them to rethink long-held ideas. Howard Zinn, 2005

This made me think about the time when I began to question the beliefs around me.  I was in the fourth grade, living in a suburb in the Bible Belt of America.  I was raised Lutheran, and sometimes I would attend a Baptist church with my next door neighbors who had a daughter my age.  Stephanie and I were good friends, but I had another friend, Kelli, who I thought of as my best friend, and I think that Stephanie was a little jealous of this fact, especially since I had known Stephanie longer.  But I enjoyed spending time with both of them, and I enjoyed going to church with Stephanie and her family.


Then, one day, Kelli's dad died.  He had a sudden heart attack just after running/biking around a park with Kelli.  I remember my parents telling me about it, and my whole world view changed.  I suddenly was so overcome with grief for my friend, and so scared at what would happen to me if my father was to die.  I spent that school day with Kelli at her house.  I remember giving her a hug and watching television with her while our mothers talked.  While this was a horrible event, and it surely was worse for Kelli than for me, this wasn't the event that started making me question things around me.  


That event happened a few days later, when Kelli came back to school.  I remember being on the playground with her, and Stephanie came up to us, and I don't remember the whole conversation, or if there was even anything said besides what Stephanie said to Kelli.  She told Kelli that her dad, who had just died, was going to hell because he didn't go to church.  Now I know that Stephanie was just a kid (we were only 9 or 10), and that she probably was just upset that Kelli was getting most of my attention before her father died, and certainly was getting all of my attention since her father died.  I do not hate Stephanie for this sentence (although Kelli might), because I do not think that she was really that horrible of a person.  I'm sure, if Stephanie remembers this now, she feels incredibly guilty for saying this.  She is not a bad person.  


But neither is Kelli and she did not deserve to hear something like that.  And her father, although I did not know him well, was not a bad person either.  So this statement did not sit well with me at all.  I disagreed with the idea that not going to church meant you were headed for hell.  I also disagreed with the idea that the simple act of going to church meant that you were safe from eternal damnation.  These two ideas may seem like they are the same thing, but they are not.  People can be horrible and go to church, but this shouldn't mean that they won't go to hell simply because they attend services every Sunday.  


So thus began my questioning of the beliefs that were around me.  I started re-thinking religion.  I started re-thinking things that were important to my 9 or 10-year-old mind:  being popular vs. being a so-called dork; doing what others wanted me to do vs. what I wanted to do or thought was right; etc.  And I realized, at some point, what I now know to be the utmost important thing in life:  kindness.  I know this sounds very "make love not war" or like I'm a hippy or something, but I really believe that being kind to others is the most important thing, for me, in life.  And this affects everything that I do, every idea I have about the world, about politics, about religion, about society.  You might call me crazy, think that I'm unrealistic and too optimistic (actually, I think of myself as more of a rationalist), but I truly believe that, simply with more kindness, the world will be a much better place.