Religious Diversity Experience

Religious Diversity

For the most part, I was raised in the Southern Baptist sect of Christianity. I must say that by the time I was 9 years old, I was disillusioned about religion because of the hypocrisy I saw in how my mother (and others) lived their lives, in contrast to the words they spoke in church. By the time I was a teenager, my mother had stopped attending church, and I had long since quit. I went through a period of time when I was truly an atheist and did not believe that there was any kind of god or "higher power." Now I'm 30, and I believe God exists, and that Jesus Christ was his son and the Savior, so that makes me a Christian, but I do no belong to any particular sect, and I never attend services. I am still repulsed by my mother's (and others') hypocrisy and narrow mindedness, which they cloak with their "religious beliefs". Please understand that I am referring only to my mother and some other individuals I know personally. Obviously, I have strong opinions about organized religion, and most of them are not positive. Don't get me wrong, I think organized religion has historically served a (mostly) good purpose, but I do not think that any one particular religion is 100% correct, nor do I think any one particular religion is 100% wrong.

I have worked at a Jewish social service agency for about two years, now. It is a non-sectarian agency, which means they will help anyone who comes to us seeking help, but they are guided by the principles and beliefs of Judaism. For me, this means I get major Jewish holidays off from work, because the agency closes for them, but I have no obligation to observe the holiday in a religious way. Lucky me. Before I started working there, all I knew was that Jews don't believe Jesus was the Savior and son of God, and that some Jews were "kosher." I have since learned more about the Jewish belief system than I ever guessed existed.

As a result of my exposure to Judaism at work, I decided to attend Friday night Shabbat