understanding religious intolerance
I took this class to fulfill an honors experience requirement. The reason why I took this class over other honors seminars is because of my Catholic background, I had taken religion classes for 12 years, so I knew I would be at least somewhat familiar with another religion class.This class taught me a lot about how to identify religious intolerance, how to avoid it, and ways to stop it.
First, this class helped me to recognize my own mistaken assumptions about other religions. This was accomplished by an overview of the basic principles of many religions, including the major religions and new religious movements. We were to write a paper on our mistaken assumptions, and what we learned about those assumptions. I wrote my paper about my assumption that the only similarity between Islam and Christianity and Judaism was their monotheistic origin. I learned that this was not the case, as they shared similarities in beliefs such as prophets, what happens after death, and places of worship. I learned from this that if people didn't have the mistaken assumptions about other religions, then they would be less likely to be intolerant towards other religions.
Next, this class helped me see the link between intolerant words and intolerant action. We explored this by looking at several different articles from newspapers and speeches that involved intolerant speech against a religion, and intolerant action against that religion related to the speech. I wrote a paper discussing the burning of Qur'ans, and found several pieces of media and personal speech that could've led to the intolerant action, and explored possible beliefs that could've led to that action. This taught me that even though sticks and stones break bones, intolerant words can lead to violent action.
Finally, the class taught me that intolerance isn't a problem just in far away countries and in the past, but that it occurs even in our own midst. Intolerance still occurs in our country, and has been a part of our past as much as religious tolerance. For this topic we wrote a paper exploring an instance of religious intolerance within 150 miles of UC's campus. I discussed an example of statues of Mary and baby Jesus being stolen from a nativity scene, and the mistaken beliefs that could've been behind these thefts and the correct stance or beliefs.
I really enjoyed this course. It was more of a discussion course, where we would read something for homework and discuss it in class. This was really beneficial to me, as it got me thinking, not only about the actions of the large-scale world, but also the actions of my own everyday life.
First, this class helped me to recognize my own mistaken assumptions about other religions. This was accomplished by an overview of the basic principles of many religions, including the major religions and new religious movements. We were to write a paper on our mistaken assumptions, and what we learned about those assumptions. I wrote my paper about my assumption that the only similarity between Islam and Christianity and Judaism was their monotheistic origin. I learned that this was not the case, as they shared similarities in beliefs such as prophets, what happens after death, and places of worship. I learned from this that if people didn't have the mistaken assumptions about other religions, then they would be less likely to be intolerant towards other religions.
Next, this class helped me see the link between intolerant words and intolerant action. We explored this by looking at several different articles from newspapers and speeches that involved intolerant speech against a religion, and intolerant action against that religion related to the speech. I wrote a paper discussing the burning of Qur'ans, and found several pieces of media and personal speech that could've led to the intolerant action, and explored possible beliefs that could've led to that action. This taught me that even though sticks and stones break bones, intolerant words can lead to violent action.
Finally, the class taught me that intolerance isn't a problem just in far away countries and in the past, but that it occurs even in our own midst. Intolerance still occurs in our country, and has been a part of our past as much as religious tolerance. For this topic we wrote a paper exploring an instance of religious intolerance within 150 miles of UC's campus. I discussed an example of statues of Mary and baby Jesus being stolen from a nativity scene, and the mistaken beliefs that could've been behind these thefts and the correct stance or beliefs.
I really enjoyed this course. It was more of a discussion course, where we would read something for homework and discuss it in class. This was really beneficial to me, as it got me thinking, not only about the actions of the large-scale world, but also the actions of my own everyday life.