Have you noticed the great evil that comes from religious exclusivity? Whenever one group of people claims that they have some kind of special arrangement with the Creator and all previous ways of relating to God are not to be tolerated, evil inevitably follows.

Zoroastrians gained power in Persia and promptly threw out the pagan religion of the Magi. Christians threw out the Pagans in Europe after stealing most of their holidays. Mayday, Christmas, Halloween, Easter – it’s all spiritual booty.

Jews have hated Arabs and denied their right to live in the traditional Biblical lands. Arabs returned their lack of hospitality with as much passion. They all give as good as they get.

Christians march into places where primitive peoples practice ancient faiths, some of them not practiced anywhere else in the world. And we tell them to forget their traditional ways and give their hearts to Jesus so they won’t burn in hell.

The Taliban persecutes infidels and destroys ancient Buddhist statues by blowing them to pieces with their tanks.

Everywhere you look, the children of God wage physical and spiritual war against each other. The blood never stops flowing, and the rest of the world looks on in amazement. When will we learn that you can’t force people to change their ways of expressing faith and devotion to the Creator?

At some point your spirit or your gut or your humanity must speak to your theology. At some point you look at your holy book, and you look at all the death and terror and ugliness that comes from fighting people with other holy books and you say, “To hell with it. I’m not doing this anymore.”