Commit Evil Cheerfully

The terrorist threat to America is real.  We are all afraid of the next attack -- on an airplane, on a train, to a skyscraper, to a boat.  We do not know when or where it will happen next, and we fear for our life and the lives of others.  And we do not understand the fanatical Muslim terrorist.

Hundreds of years ago the great French philosopher Pascal wrote: “Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.”  Of course he was not referring to Muslim terrorists.  He was probably thinking of, among others, Christian Crusaders who invaded the Holy Land to kill Muslims & reclaim the land for Christians.  It could equally be applied to those who burned witches in Salem Massachusetts.

Today, it can be applied to both sides in the conflict taking place in Iraq and elsewhere.

President Bush said God was on our side when we invaded Iraq.  We were the good guys getting rid of the evil dictator Saddam Hussein.  Yes, we caused much collateral damage as we label it.  Collateral damage means that innocent civilians were killed as we sought what we thought was a good cause, a cause our God would approve of:  Men never do evil so completely and cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.

It is hard for us to see a Muslim terrorist as a cheerful person.  We think he, or she, is committing an evil act.  Thousands of innocent civilians have been killed in Madrid, Spain, in New York City, in countless other places around the globe as bombs explode in nightclubs and bus stations.  We in the west think these people are committing evil acts.

But they do not see these acts as evil.  They feel they are doing the right thing.  They are attacking the satanic western powers who have invaded their country, the western powers who are trying to impose their way of life, their economic system, their religious beliefs on countries that believe in a totally different God.  Men never do evil so completely & cheerfully as when they do it from religious conviction.

Religion is responsible for much that is good in the long history of the world; religion is responsible for many evil acts committed from deep religious conviction.

 

Copyright © 2004   Henry Morgenstein

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