Religion - Becca Libby

I believe Religion is a radical force in all cultures. People will use religion as an excuse for anything. Although many people in this country view religion as a very personal thing, many view it as a way to bring communities together, in a social construct. From the beginning of human life, we have been searching for an explanation to life's most confusing and seemingly unanswerable questions. It made sense to explain these questions by deities. Something great and powerful, something beyond our control. Native Americans as well as Hindu religions used animals to portray gods.
People need a crutch in their lives, something they can lean on when times are tough. Religion gets people through death, depression, and fears. It can be the best of things, and the worst of things. People use religion to start wars, and as an excuse for violence and ignorant hatred. Our country is mostly Christians, at least where I live, and many of them do not expose their religion radically. Some however, do so in the worst ways. When I was a kid, about 12, I went to church with my neighbors one Sunday. Having grown up in a non religious household, this was my first time going. At the end of the service, which I had no feeling toward one way or the other, they asked for anyone who had not been saved to come up and become saved. I had no idea what that meant at all, but someone next to me grabbed my hand and trusted it into to air. The preached dragged me to the front and yelled to the whole congregation "This is a child of sin! She needs to be saved! Jesus needs to come into her and bring her from the ways of the devil!" I was literally terrified. I ripped my hand away from him and ran out of the church. I went home crying that day and my mom forbid me to ever go to church again.

So, now that I'm older and I understand what was happening in that church, I cannot say that I am a fan of these practices. I am happy for people that have a religion, and can appreciate it and be proud of it, but people who use it as a way to hate other people do not understand what it is really about.