Rosh Hashanah & Yom Kippur Sermons
Religion Ruins Everything
by Rabbi Elyse Goldstein
One day in the zoo, the zoo-keeper noticed that an orangutan was reading two books - the Bible and Darwin's Origin of Species. Surprised, he asked the monkey, "Why are you reading both those books?" "Well," said the orangutan, "I just wanted to know if I was my brother's keeper— or my keeper's brother."
Either way, people are spilling a lot of ink writing books for and against that monkey being our distant relative. And there are a lot of people writing about how those two ideas— the Bible and evolution— were, are, and always will be at loggerheads. Interestingly enough, it is both “creationists” and “Darwinists” invested in showing how these two ideas cannot be synchronised. There are politicians in Toronto who— to get the very important “Jewish vote” on funding for faith-based schools— claim that both evolution and the Biblical narrative of creation can be taught side by side in school, as equal “theories”. I don’t want to spend any time this morning trying to make the two accounts of creation jive—that’s a futile exercise like “Bible codes” trying to prove that G-d knew several thousand years ago that Yitzchak Rabin would be assassinated, put that secret in a code encrypted in the Torah, and then patiently waited till the computer was invented so we could find the secret out in a seminar. I don't believe for a second that the world is only 5,768 years old, and I doubt any of you do; and I understand the stories of Genesis to be stories of faith, not of science. I like to say they are true with a big T but not necessarily true with a small t. It’s fashionable these days to pit science and faith against each other as duelling opposites; to posit that followers of religion are irrational muddle-brained cretins who will believe anything and that science has been rejected by them all; and to reduce the argument to religion vs. no religion by saying that religion at its very core is not only flawed but dangerous.
But instead of casting blame on fundamentalism, these now-famous authors for the cause of “atheism” castigate all religion with cover titles like “How Religion Poisons Everything” and “The End of Faith”. These books begin with familiar territory I’ve heard all my life, “More people are killed in the name of religion than anything good religion has ever done” but the new message is a strong “therefore”: religion should be hated, reviled, and ultimately outlawed. Of course people have also been killed for totally secular causes as well: the Tamil Tigers of Sri Lanka, an avowedly secular movement of national liberation who regularly practice suicide bombing; the Soviet atheists who killed millions of people in the political “purges” of the 20th century; the kids who kill each other over drugs and power and gang wars. But the authors argue that most of the world’s conflicts are caused by religion, and that religion at its core not only resists progress but actually impedes progress.
According to Nobel Prize winner Steven Weinberg, scientists must rise up to the challenge of liberating humanity from "the long nightmare of religion." Biologist Richard Dawkins tells us that we need to "come out of the closet" and form a political lobby of committed atheists and scientists to do public battle with religion. Christopher Hitchens and Sam Harris and other “anti-religionists” say its time for atheists to rise up and destroy religion before it destroys us. I think that’s a bit histrionic but I do see the real and actual danger that religion in its extreme form poses to us today. We liberals are quick to say “live and let live” but what do we do when religious fundamentalists with bombs say “we live and don’t let live?” When religious fundamentalists with guns say “we live but if you perform abortions you die”? When religious fundamentalists with votes say “we will be sure to put into political power only those who agree with us and who will turn this country into a “G-d fearing” Christian country or religious Jewish state?” It’s one thing when traditionalists choose to have an Orthodox wedding, but in Israel, for example, liberal Jews cannot choose to have a Reform or Conservative wedding. Live and let live? When the world leader of Catholicism still refuses to condone the use of condoms which have been proven to be effective against the spread of AIDS, I say it’s fine for him not to use one, but why should those in countries most affected by AIDS be denied that safety? Aren’t we duty bound to fight this religious doctrinism, to defeat it, outshout it, outvote it?
I understand where the critics of religion are coming from when I remember September 11. And I think about the assassination of Yitzhak Rabin. And I read about the assassination of Doctor Barnett Slepian the New York doctor who performed abortions, killed by a Christian fundamentalist sniper with a bullet through his own living room window. When I saw the film Jesus Camp about kids being indoctrinated into Evangelical Christianity by calling themselves “warriors for Christ” and then I went to the Chabad website- yes, Chabad, those friendly tefillin-putting-on mitzvah mobile Jews, and saw that their kids youth group is called Tzivos Hashem- G-d’s army. Oh I used to be self righteous as a Jew about this, we don’t kill anyone in G-d’s name, we don’t murder people just because they aren’t Jewish- but our more modern history is stained with blood as both Jews and Moslems rest their claims to a land solely on “G-d given rights.”
You might say, then, let’s throw the whole thing out. But if we say all religion stinks, then we’ve abdicated our responsibility to protect Judaism from itself, from becoming an irrelevant, rule-based, pilpulistic relic that makes absolutely no sense whatsoever in the 21st century and in fact, may contribute to the ruin of our civilization by continuing to preach and practice a second class standard for women, a disengagement from modern ideas, a reliance on Divine protection (to the point of not seatbelting your kids in the car because “G-d is watching them”), an insulation from those who are “different”. If in fact I told you, that you had only one choice in being Jewish would you choose a Judaism that did not reflect your values? Or would you abandon Judaism altogether? I honestly think most Jews would walk away. Then why do we say “they are saving Judaism” when in the end it may be us and only us who can save Judaism from becoming a right-wing fundamentalist sect that teaches creationism and isolationism?
If we say all religion stinks, then we’ve abdicated our responsibility to present a sane, modern, egalitarian, peace-loving, community-building, inclusive, world-changing Judaism: which is exactly what it is supposed to be, not some small minded sect that cares only about itself, thinks only it has the truth, and dismisses— worse, harms— anyone who disagrees.
And if we say all religion stinks, then we’ve abdicated our responsibility to make sure that liberal religion— and in our particular case, liberal Judaism— is the voice that represents Judaism, is the vote that carries the day, is the thoughtful answer to the challenges that critics of religion pose.
I don’t know who is going to win, but if the conflict is between an intolerant scientific rational approach to life and an intolerant superstitious fundamentalist religious approach, we’ve all lost. There has to be a middle ground.
So instead of saying all religion stinks I’m prepared to say the answer is liberal religion. Liberal religion which is born of the synthesis of modern reason and ancient ideals— ideals, not ancient ideas—liberal religion which uses the tools of science and modernity as a filter to sift out antiquated and superstitious notions that hold back human progress and societal advancement.
The answer is to insist we take the best of religion and leave the rest behind. That's originally what Reform Judaism set out to do but it got side-tracked by concentrating on getting rid of beautiful and meaningful rituals— tallit, Shabbat, Sukkah, kashrut—in its quest to push social action and tikkun olam to the front of the agenda. The two—ritual and social action— aren't mutually exclusive and that's what modern Reform Judaism and in fact all of liberal Judaism now understands.
The answer is to take religion’s most redeeming qualities, the gifts that science cannot give us: community, stability, family, tikkun olam, rituals, connection to G-d and goodness, values, caring for others, sanctifying time, creating beautiful space, self reflection, self improvement, and reject the “price tag” of losing feminism, gay marriage, evolution, scientific research, reproductive rights.
The answer is to insist that the gifts which religion gives us be packaged correctly. What are these gifts?
One: spiritual comfort. Not comfort food that is pablum for the soul like don’t worry about evil, it will all be answered in the next life, in the world to come. But rather, spiritual comfort that comes from analyzing sacred texts critically, asking deep questions of those texts and creatively interpreting old texts in new ways.
Two: community, but not looking over your right shoulder all the time because your religious neighbor is watching and you feel you have to be more like them to be accepted into the community which judges you for how you dress or where you send your kids to school. But rather, a community which struggles together to find new meaning in ancient rituals and creatively tries new things together without judgement or ridicule.
Three: family, but not only one definition of family that leaves out single parents, intermarrieds, gay and lesbian families, couples without kids. Rather, families of all shapes and sizes, families of choice and families of origin, traditional families and new families that will become traditional as soon as we stop calling them alternative.
Four: compassion, but not just for your own. Jewish tradition asks why the stork is not kosher, because after all it has the beautiful name in Hebrew, chasida- the compassionate one. Even though it’s called chasida it isn’t kosher because it is only compassionate for its own children, but is vicious to the other birds around it. Rather, a compassion born of Jewish expereince that carries us out of our suffering into the suffering of others.
Five: history, but not history that is selective or just plain stupid, like the world was literally created 5,768 years ago. Rather, a history marked by truthtelling and adaptation and accomodation and greatness as well as struggle.
And six: truth, but not the only truth, and not a truth worth killing for, rather a truth with a small t that saves lives and saves the planet and holds up the highest ideals of humanity.
The best of religion is what liberal religion could offer a world that is moving steadily toward religious excess and backward from religious evolution. A downright rejection of the worst: a rejection of religious hierarchy, which causes people to follow religious leaders blindly, or idolize them to the point where they become objects of fantasy and desire and they themselves become inured to the power they hold over their adoring subjects. A rejection of religious infantilization by religious leaders who keep people powerless and cowered by their lack of knowledge and needy of those who hold the keys to the secrets that only they know. A rejection of religious sexism, which remains the last bastion; a sexism so tolerated we are blind to it. Imagine going into a bank and having to do your business behind a curtain because you are a woman, or because you are Asian you have to enter the bank by a different door marked “Asian entrance.” A rejection of religious homophobia which cares more about what people do in the privacy of their bedrooms than what we do to the planet and to each other .
Religion gives us the kind of gifts that “irrational” love or art or music do; and its adherents are not stupid. People are not drawn to religion just because of a fear of death or other weak reasons. Steven Reiss, professor of psychology and psychiatry at Ohio State University, found there are many worthy human psychological needs that motivate people to seek meaning through religion. These basic human needs are not all about human insecurity. The desires he suggests include positive attributes like independence, curiosity, acceptance, order, saving, honor, idealism, social contact, family, romance, and tranquility.
“For most of us trapped in the human condition, in a world and a universe at most indifferent to our existence, we crave a connection to something larger than ourselves.” writes RP Bird. ”Science as it exists now is a tool. It cannot give us that connection. For that we seek out religion... Religion ...is a way to know ourselves, to order our lives with morality and faith. The religious right is in error if they think their beliefs inform them about the physical universe. ..science (is) in error if they think they can turn a beautiful tool for viewing the universe into a way into the human soul. Both corrupt what they love by trying to turn it into something it cannot be.”
This year I will celebrate my 25th year in the Rabbinate. I will even get that proverbial gold watch- an honorary doctorate from my seminary. For 25 years I’ve been preaching this message: don't be ashamed that you are a liberal Jew, don’t think of Judaism as a “ladder” with Orthodox on the top and you on the bottom, Don’t think more stringencies and more rules and more repression makes a more authentic Judaism. It’s time. I need a community of advocates for liberal religion. Liberal religion that insists on the full equality before G-d of women and men, gay and straight, rich and poor, young and old. Liberal religion with a passion for justice that marks it as a religious value, not just a secular or civic one. Liberal religion that considers itself the authentic form of its historic ancestor. Liberal religion that not only professes these ideals, but safeguards them by practicing tikkun olam as the highest form of religious action; by teaching gratefulness instead of mastery, by helping us to find a life of meaning without harming anyone else, by giving us new and inclusive rituals to celebrate our life’s passages, by giving us a community which nurtures all of us and values all of us and helps us connect to a G-d who cares more about what you are than what you wear.
The answer is liberal religion that believes in itself as much as fundamentalist religion does. The answer is a liberal religious passion that matches the fundamentalist passion. The answer is a liberal Judaism that shows people the way.
Like the story of the priest and the rabbi who were fishing on the side of the road. They thoughtfully made a sign saying, "The End is Near! Turn yourself around now before it's too late!" and showed it to each passing car. One driver who drove by didn't appreciate the sign and shouted at them, "Leave us alone, you religious nuts!" All of a sudden they heard a big splash, looked at each other, and said, "You think maybe we should have just said 'Bridge broken ahead' instead?"
Religion can still can show the way if our signs are clear.
Shana Tova.
