“Tolerance means learning to accept and
live with the differences in people. A tolerant person accepts that other
people have different opinions to his and allows them to express them freely.”
At least that is what our grade 7 textbook says,
which covers the topics of religion and culture. This buzzword “tolerance” has
grabbed my attention in a strong way because it seems to be one of the most
popular mantras of our generation. It is ardently “preached” that what is
needed to solve the conflicts in the world is more tolerance. It is not unusual
for me now to overhear people bemoaning the fact that if only we could learn to
accept and learn from each other’s differences we would have such a beautiful,
harmonious society.
I have noticed that, in order to further
this cause, proponents of this philosophy will constantly look for the
commonalities between different cultures and religions and at the end exclaim,
“You see! We are not so different after all! It doesn’t matter what holy book
you read or what clothes you wear, we all want the same things in the end.” All
talk of differences and exclusivity is frowned upon because, what positive end
could such talk possibly achieve? It only causes more animosity and disharmony.
One of our many home-grown activists for
this cause is Desmond Tutu. You may or may not be aware of this but amongst his
many titles and accolades, Desmond Tutu was the first black Archbishop of
Capetown in the Anglican church. One of the causes that he has championed as
Archbishop is that of the gospel, that is, the Gospel of Tolerance. Now you may
be wondering if this gospel of tolerance is the same as the Gospel of Christ?
Well, let me give you a quote from his book “God is not a Christian: and other
provocations”:
“We do scant justice
and honour to our God if we want, for instance, to deny that Mahatma Gandhi was
a truly great soul, a holy man who walked closely with God. Our God would be
too small if he was not also the God of Gandhi: if God is one, as we believe,
then he is the only God of all his people, whether they acknowledge him as such
or not.”
I’m not sure if
this answers your question? It should do. Tutu despises exclusivity of any kind
for, as I have already explained, it is this exclusivity that threatens to
unravel the fabrics of our society, and so he says:
“The accidents of birth and geography determine to a very large extent to what faith we belong. The chances are very great that if you were born in Pakistan you are a Muslim, or a Hindu if you happened to be born in India, or a Shintoist if it is Japan, and a Christian if you were born in Italy. I don't know what significant fact can be drawn from this -- perhaps that we should not succumb too easily to the temptation to exclusiveness and dogmatic claims to a monopoly of the truth of our particular faith.”[i]
So when he speaks of “tolerance” for other
religions he means a lot more than accepting that people have different
opinions and allowing them to express them freely. He takes objection to anyone
claiming to have a religion which holds the absolute truth. He sees this as
arrogance and foolishness. The tolerance that he is advocating is not out of
respect for people with different beliefs because they deserve to be respected
as human beings. He is advocating tolerance for the differences of others
because, “We must be ready to learn from one another, not claiming that we
alone possess all truth and that somehow we have a corner on God.”[ii]
I have grown very suspicious of all this talk
of tolerance. It is a very sly philosophy which pretends to be one thing and
then surprises us with another. It pretends to advocate consideration and
respect for other religions, which I would happily support, and then it boxes
us into a corner and pressures us into recanting the very heart of the message
of the true gospel of Christ. Why do I say this? Well let us look further at
the predicament which Tutu finds himself in.
“You have to understand is that the Bible is really a library of books and it has different categories of material. There are certain parts which you have to say no to. The Bible accepted slavery. St Paul said women should not speak in church at all and there are people who have used that to say women should not be ordained. There are many things that you shouldn't accept."[iii]And so for Tutu there is a difference between the gospel of tolerance and the gospel of Christ. Where the Bible seems to be intolerant of other people’s beliefs we must sacrifice those passages of scripture to modern day popular philosophies. For Tutu, the cure for this world’s maladies are not obedience to Christ, the cure is more tolerance. He says, for example, in speaking about homosexuality in Africa, “I am deeply disturbed that in the face of some of the most horrendous problems facing Africa, we concentrate on ‘what do I do in bed with whom.’”[iv] As if to say that the morality of Christ is a sideline issue when addressing the more serious problems facing Africans. But the Bible clearly states that it is these moral failings that cause the conflict and trouble in our world.
The irony of it all is that all this talk of tolerance actually breeds a kind of intolerance. This comes about when we as Christian’s do not join Tutu’s train and glibly discard the unpopular doctrines which the Bible teaches. All of a sudden we Bible believers are labelled “intolerant”, arrogant and unkind. And so when we truly believe what our religion professes we are regarded as trouble-stirrers and disturbers of the peace. Our contemporary society is growing increasingly intolerant of these “fundamentalist” Christians who refuse to smudge out the inconvenient truths of scripture or refuse to deny the exclusivity of the Gospel which says that all may come to Christ, but it is only through Christ that we are saved.
I am a firm supporter of a tolerant society in which everyone is free to express their views without fear of discrimination. What I cannot accept is this ridiculous idea that every religion should compromise on what they believe to be true in order to accommodate all the others. The ways in which religions are practiced may vary according to how they interpret their “holy book”, in this we may have room to learn, but to compromise on the very explicit meanings that have been passed along to us by angels is to say that we either do not believe our religion to be from God at all or that we esteem the opinions of man higher than that of God. If “tolerance” means what Tutu says and we should all take a pair of scissors to our Bibles then we need to fight to regain the true meaning of the word.
Please feel free to add your thoughts in the comments.
[i] God is not a Christian: and other provocations
[ii] God is not a Christian: and other provocations
[iii] Tutu urges leaders to agree climate deal
[iv] Tutu stands up for gays
[v] My thinking on Tolerance vs Intolerance has been significantly influenced by the teachings of Ravi Zacharias.
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