(
an essay prompted by commentary in the 2016 Presidential Candidates thread)
Discussing religion in the context of politics is acceptable when we use our scriptures to guide our own behaviors and inform our own morality.
It is violence to use one's own subjective scriptures in ways that cause objective harm to others.
One can say Clinton is not ethical enough for me. One can say Trump is factually a serial liar. These are moral judgements and ethical facts.
In this country of USA, religion is not a acceptable societal yardstick for governing; it is in the constitution, no religious test for running, and thus none for serving or governing.
One can not say, while dining on shell fish, "Bible says so, so laws must".
Politics is morality and ethics.
Ethics means being good. Good people have always been; even in those thousands of years that God neglected to provide a savior.
Dharma, polite conduct (PC) is not a mandate of God, it is a manifestation of Truth (God).
We all know this. Who can truly affirm they want to be lied to, stolen from, cheated by, or in any other way seek disturbance in one's own life? OK, don't harm others.
Those who have knowledge of God, know nothing. One may be deeply versed in chapter and verse of one's scripture, ignoring or denying any validity in others, and still not know truth.
Not knowing is natural. Knowledge replaces ignorance. All ignoring of the known is subjectivity.
To know God, is to no longer identify as being separate from the limitless whole and thus, by being the whole, you can not bring disturbance to what is essentially your own "Self".
However not knowing this, others' subjectivity can falsely attribute their disturbed lives unto others (i.e. Trump voters), even Saints.
God is not an '
other' that can be the "
object" of knowledge.
What means of knowledge (what 5 senses and what logic) can reveal the limitless?
What we understand of knowledge and learning is all about the temporal and relative world, not the absolute. Mathematics reveals this side of the 'Big Bang' event horizon. Math began then and can't reveal the Big Bang behind itself.
Scriptures serve to reveal that which can not be verified. Scripture has truth and place when we are seeking to understand the "Absolute". Applying scripture to legislation brings disturbance; and it is unconstitutional.
Here among us in the USA and elsewhere among others, the use of scripture to justify political repression and harm to other people is a failure of understanding, and cause of ungodly disasters. When laws are justified with scripture that is misunderstood, lied about, mistaught, poorly translated, deliberately misapplied, etc- there is a complete failure of understanding.
"Render onto Caesar..." etc.
I am a Hindu; I believe (so to speak) 100% in God. Indeed, for Advaitin, there is nothing but God.
Other religions say God is limitless, boundless and infinite, but you too really exist as other than that limitlessness.
If one knows truth, one ceases to be a disturbance or problem to others.
If one knows Truth, no longer is there any reason to fear or push back against reality.
If one knows the truth, why continue to build walls?
To Mike Pence and his ilk, I say, God makes people gay.
If this is not true of you (whoever you are or think yourself to be), then you are unhappy.
Only the joyous join God.
So, yes there is
disturbance without truthiness when in our Constitutional USA, there are those who are SO sure of their subjective projections ( like creation is 6000 years old), so certain of their reflected back world, colored by such selfish assurance, that they are willing to cause (or allow) actual harm to others (because others fall short of their moral projections).