When organized religion seeks to teach people how to live and how to appreciate the essence of life, realization of goals is achieved. However, when people are encouraged to commit contemptible and staggering acts in the name of God, it gives rise to immoral things. History supports this claim in many ways but for this writing; the focus is on war and hate crimes. Wars, triggered by organized religion have made their mark in history. The terrorist attack on the World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the crash of the plane in Pennsylvania all had a religious connection, radical Fundamentalist Muslim terrorists. Organized religion has created religious warfare. Organized religion is also responsible for many hate crimes. Following the attacks on September 11, many persons of Muslim and Arab descent were victims of hate crimes simply because they shared the same ethnicity and religion as the perpetrators.
Religion can also be seen as a force which helps us discriminate between the good and evil .If there were no religion or any commandments then everybody would do what feels good to them and the world would be in a chaos. So religion can be seen as a regulator which regulates the world. Each and every corner of this world has been touched by one or the other religion. Every religion teaches more or less the same things to follow, the path of love, compassion, honesty, truth etc. Love thy neighbor as thyself, the most famous Christian commandment teaches us to love another person and treat him well just like we want for ourselves. Today the world is making advancement in technology and science but this has led to more confusion, stress, rise in crimes and violence. With all these going on how do we follow the paths that make our lives serene, peaceful and better?
Bibliography:
1. Harris, Sam (2004). The end of faith: Religion, Terror, and the future of Reason. Retrieved 12 July 2014. Sam Harris delivers a startling analysis of the clash between reason and religion in the modern world. He offers a vivid, historical tour of our willingness to suspend reason in favor of religious beliefs even when these beliefs inspire the worst human atrocities. While warning against the encroachment of organized religion into world politics, Harris draws on insights from neuroscience, philosophy, and Eastern mysticism to deliver a call for a truly modern foundation for ethics and spirituality that is both secular and humanistic.
2. Harris, Sam (2006).Letter to a Christian Nation. Letter to a Christian Nation" is a rallying cry to rationalists everywhere and should serve as a wakeup call to retrograde Christians eagerly toiling away to displace science with magical thinking, overturn a woman's right to choose, relegate gays and lesbians to second class citizenship, or ensure the apocalypse. Harris presents concise arguments with lucidity, brevity and impact. If you haven't read his prior book "The End of Faith" the thesis of "Letter to a Christian Nation" will be startling and new. If you have, this worthy distillate of his prior work specifically focuses on the fundamentalist follies and foibles of America's cleverly marketed McJesus movement. With deft strokes Harris pens a number of reasons not to be a Christian - or religious at all. He exposes the unreasonableness of faith, explaining with clarity and philosophical rigor why there is no real justification for believing in God, and how the notion of "faith" does little to justify any unfounded belief, or merit respect for same.
3. Harris, Sam (2009). "The moral landscape How science could determine human values". ProQuest. Retrieved 12 July 2014.
Harris argues forcefully for the superiority of science over religion as a means of determining morality and understanding the subtle gradations between permanent truths and culturally and historically determined values.
4. Cathy Driscoll (2004) Technical spirituality at work :Jacques Ellul on workplace spirituality
This paper considers the incorporation of spirituality in the workplace how it helps the employees to be more productive, energetic and committed in the workplace and how it transforms the employees to gain an environment which is unconditional and not objectified.
5. Brian J Zinnbauer et al (1999) .The emerging meanings of religiousness and spirituality: Problems and Prospects
This paper focuses on how psychologists perceive spirituality and religion and also suggest the alternative ways to approach spirituality and religion.
6. Fahri Karakas (2009) Spirituality and Performance in Organizations: A Literature Review
This paper provides a summary of about 140 articles which are based on spirituality in workplace .Not only it focuses on the advantages of incorporation of spirituality in workplace but also provides a recommendation how to incorporate spirituality positively in a stressful work environment .It provides a different perspective on the benefits of incorporation of spirituality.
7. Evans, T David; Cullen, Francis T; Dunaway, R Gregory ( 1995); Burton, Velmer S, Jr Religion and crime reexamined: The impact of religion, secular controls, and social ecology on adult criminality.
This paper best describes the relationship between crime and religion. It explains how religion affects a person who often indulges in criminal acts .How a behavioral change can be observed in criminals if they practice religion.
8. Sandra Millon Underwood, Rhonda L. Powell (2006) Religion and Spirituality: Influence on Health/Risk Behavior and Cancer Screening Behavior of African Americans According to the National Cancer Institute, African Americans are at a high risk of being affected by cancer.
The influence of religion was observed on the health/risk behavior and cancer screening practices of this group.
9. Yaw M. Mensah (2013).An Analysis of the Effect of Culture and Religion on Perceived Corruption in a Global Context
Corruption is an emerging problems affecting the world's economy. This paper focuses on the two fold aspect of religion. To examine whether religion has any impact on the prevalent corruption system and also whether other religious besides the Protestant Christianity has an anti corruption effect.
10. Jaco Beyers (2010) Religion, civil society and conflict: What is it that religion does for and to society?
This paper best describes the sociological approach of religion. This paper is a reflection on how religion influences the society and
promotes civility.
11 Heather Widows(2004) Religion as a moral source :can religion functiona as a shared source of moral authority and values in a liberal democracy?
12. Richard Lakeman (2013).Talking science and wishing for miracles: Understanding cultures of mental health practice.
Science deals with a prescribed knowledge and medicine Although psychiatry has scientific approach but a sociological and cultural approach based on faith and religion has helped clinicians and nurses to improvise the mental health care system
13. Elaine Howard Ecklund,Elizabeth Long (2011) Scientists and Spirituality
How spirituality or religion is perceived by scientists and how it affects them, also a comparative analysis was done to find out spirituality in general population with that of scientists