K.Mark.Demma
REL 111
18 Dec 1996

Reflections on the Course Exploring Religion through Experience

At the community college I attended before WWC, I very much wanted to take the only religion course offered: world religions, but it was cancelled several times from lack of interest after I had registered. When I finally got to course, however, I was very disappointed. The Professor would pass out something that contained some very basic ideas of a particular religion and then proceeded to read it, verbatim, slowly, until we all had lapsed into a coma. Besides the fact that the professor was boring and read rather than lectured, I was dismayed by the fact that, like so much else in college, you merely read about something that can't really be understood unless experienced or at least observed. Your religion class was so much more meaningful to me. (<= note the kissing up hoping for a better grade.) The basic knowledge was a good thing to have, but what I found most worthwhile was experiencing the services. I don't think that I really learned as much about any particular theology at these services as I gained an understanding of the people involved with it.

I am beginning to see that theology sometimes is not all that important, that it is not as much what dogma a person subscribes to, but what they do with that dogma. For some, the stories, myths and creeds are taken quite literally and very seriously. For example, the members of the Mt. Zion Church seemed to take the biblical accounts quite literally as did the Muslims we met. Others, like many of the Jews we met and some of the Christians, have been able to expand their faith beyond the mythic-literal level and start to explore different meanings and ways of seeing the world. To be sure, some religions leave much less flexibility than others, for example Islam. Even in this religion that practically demands conformity, some have found ways of unique expression, such as the Sufis.

I think that what I have learned is that when it comes right down to it, what matters is not as much what the religion is but rather how the individual lives their life. Religion can be a positive or negative force in someone's life and granted some religions have oppression built into their basic idealogy. But religion can be a powerful binding force for a community or a rallying cry for social justice.

These observations have helped me in my own understanding of others. I can no longer lump, for instance, all Christians in a category of "bad" because of my experience with some Christians. Granted, I so not subscribe to the theology, but I have seen where it can actually be used to bring about some good in the world, which is something I would not have felt before.

I thank you for offering a course which uses this format, rather than a more traditional one that would save you much time and effort. I also appreciate your honesty and the openness you have shown when sharing your personal feelings with the class. The atmosphere you have created is less of a classroom and more of an encounter group or a group that is on a spiritual quest together.