Sunday, March 22, 2009

There are a growing number of people around the world now, who have lost their religious, ideological, social and psychological glasses; people who no longer look at the world through mentally dyed filters.

The first step in this process is loosing ones religion or ideology. Many are the disappointed people who fully realize that their so deeply embraced religion or ideology created nothing but horrors. Nazism, Communism, Liberalism, Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, Judaism… The list could be made almost endless. A liberal would say that I am wrong because he is still wearing his liberal glasses. He can't see that the slave trade and the colonialism was a result of the idea that egoism is good and in our blood. This idea has guided us all the way until today, though slavery has taken other forms in the Asian sweatshops. Many Christians would say that I am wrong because they can’t see that Christianity was a part of the slave trade, the colonialism, the oppression of women and children, the inquisition trials and the witch-hunts. The Christian churches have always sided with the rich and mighty, this king or that king, this warlord or that warlord.

Many people have changed their religious beliefs, Hindus have become Muslims, Protestants have become Catholics, communists have become liberals, but a small group of people couldn’t find anything new to hold on to. They have clearly seen the problems in their Church, sect or political club and left it, without being able to find a new better belief system. They no longer define themselves as anything, not atheists, not agnostics, not nihilists, not believers in science, nothing. This small group of people does not believe in anything anymore, and they don’t fell depressed or disappointed about it. They feel a relief. They feel that they don’t have any use for a new cage or a new belief system. No religion or ideology simply makes any sense to them anymore.

The second step in this awakening process is the shedding of all the psychological and sociological beliefs. I’m no good. I’m stupid. My noose is too big. I’m fantastic. I'm superior. I'm inferior. I really have to become something. She is ugly. I belong to a higher class… The list of useless psychological and sociological beliefs can be made almost endless. However, a growing number of people are now leaving their personal beliefs behind simply because they don’t make sense anymore. Ambition, self-invented depression, self-improvement, self-help books, private religion, new age; no mental constructions what so ever is important anymore. A growing number of people no longer care at all about beliefs, their own beliefs or someone else's makes no difference.

The third step in the awakening is the realization that the present now is extremely important. Eckhart Tolle and the Buddhists have opened our eyes to this fact but this doesn’t make us Eckhart Tolleists or Buddhists. It is not necessary to define oneself at all. I am a human being. I am sitting here at my computer, writing this and drinking coffee. When you read this, I am no longer here. I am somewhere else with something else in mind.

The forth step in the awakening must imply care fore other people, other animals and our planet, though this care is not based on religion or belief systems. Karen Armstrong explains that at the core of all religions, there is compassion and that compassion is far more important than belief. (Look at her charterforcompassion.com.) She is right, I suppose. However, what is the use for religion then, with this knowledge? What is the use then for dress codes, rituals, sharia laws and all the rules, regulations and dogmas that make up the religions? Why not leave the religions and go for compassion directly?

So, this is a charter for compassion and justice without religion, faith, ideology or science. This is a charter for the realization that we're all in the same boat, that we're all humans and that it is in our nature to care for others, not just to compete, fuzz and fight.