Interfaith UN Conference

During this last week, the United Nations was the host of a conference on Religious Tolerance, which had been initiated and promoted by the King of Saudi Arabia. King Abdullah gave a well received speech calling for greater tolerance and understanding between all religions.

While the King was saying all the right things about religious tolerance in New York, the reality in Saudi Arabia is much different. 100% of the population is Muslim. More than that, the dominant form of Islam observed in Saudi Arabia is Wahhabism, which is a conservative Sunni form of Islam. There are no Christian churches nor Jewish synagogues there, since there are no Christians or Jews who are citizens.

In Saudi Arabia, even other forms of Islam face persecution. There are a number of stories of Shi'a and Sufi Muslims, for example, being forbidden to practice their faith as they understand it.

As I read about this conference and the King's speech, I wondered what it would be like to live in a religiously monolithic country. There are neighborhoods and regions in our country that are close to that, but there is great religious diversity across the country, even in Salt Lake City Utah. If I did live in a country where I wass like everyone else and everyone else was like me, I wondered how I would feel about people of other faiths. Would I want to know how they understood things religious? Would I want to know how they practiced their faith, or would I be content to ignore them, since they must be wrong. I will never know what it would be like to live in a country like that, of course, but I wonder how that change my own understanding of my faith.

I thought about the folks who read this blog. Would you like to live in a country where everyone else is whatever you are? Why or why not?