Report
Over the centuries there have been many wars, most of them have been for different reasons, one of the recurring themes is religious strife. As a christian, this makes me very sad. In this report I will talk about past religious wars, talk about the causes of religious wars and explain why I believe we combat religious wars by nurturing and taking care of their people.
Religious war is similar to any war, a group of people launch an assault on another group of people, except in religious war, there is a difference in drive. It may be a radical misinterpretation of the group's source of religion, or a religion firmly hating another religion, etc. This, the fact that usually one religion is the attacker, and that they are attacking for a religious reason is what separates religious war from normal war. You can trace religious war post A.C. all the way back to 1090, and it’s still happening now. This is a problem.
This graph shows the comparison between non religious conflicts, religious identity conflicts, and religious issue conflicts. Although the non religious conflicts are worse, religious war is still a problem. And if we tackled every problem in the world, one problem at a time, we would have a perfect world.
Religious war is usually motivated by a religious cause, from research I can tell you the main causes. Land is a big motive, imagine if your brother took a chocolate block that you paid for and it was for yourself. Another one is hate, muslims were treated unfairly by Americans for a long time which made muslims hate Americans, this ended in war. The last but I think most important is religious belief. This is very important because if radically interpreted wrong could result in many conflicts. This is because as a Christian, Buddhist, etc, you desire to serve your lord and follow his commandments. Atheists wouldn’t understand but, if the word you followed, (for example the bible) told you to jump off a cliff, you probably would. This is why it’s the biggest motivation.
Religious war can have many effects, here are some. Death, many, many people die from war and many of them didn’t even fight! Destruction of property, heaps of things get destroyed in the crossfire. One that applied in the olden days is, slaves were set free from their masters because their masters had to go fight. People had to leave their families and young people had to fight. Meaning that, young men would leave their wives who would probably become widowed. In fact, my nana remembers her dad leaving to go to war, thankfully he returned.
Protests are an old but effective method of preventing religious war. Protests are the voice of the people having their say, this is helpful, because a priority of a leader is to listen to the people, (unless it is an attacker in the lead) but, it may aggravate the leader, which results in more bloodshed. Protests are cheap, but they could get out of hand due to lack of leadership. (unless they have a leader). And lastly, efficiency, efficiency depends on the people being protested to so it’s about half and half. Overall this method is a bit of a double sided cannon, you might accidentally shoot yourself.
Government assistance is a debatable method. It is, government members using their widespread and money to attempt to counter religious war. For example, after the mosque shootings of 2019 the government took away guns, in the same way, the government could do this. This method isn’t very convenient, it costs a lot; it has not many flaws where leadership is concerned. It has a very high chance to aggravate the attackers, and isn’t very efficient, this isn't a very good method.
Religious leaders are a good method of preventing religious war. It is having religious leaders monitor the people to make sure that their teachings don’t radically change. For example, homegroup is a way of doing this. Helpfully, this method is already being used in church. This method is convenient, because it is simple and is already being done. Cheap, because all it requires is people to show up, no other necessary costs. You wouldn’t have to worry about leadership because, well you know why. Low aggravation chance because it is an old practice, and efficient because leaders can actively challenge people to change.
Pluses
Minuses
Interesting Points
Protests
Enables people to take action
Might agravate attackers
Religious Leaders
Government policy
Protests
Religious Leaders
Government policy
Convenience
1
1
4
Cost
1
1
4
Leadership
3
1
2
Aggrevation chance
4
2
5
Efficiency
3
2
3
Total
12
7
18
Out of these solutions I have found Religious leaders to be the best. It is free, it is very convenient, it works well, it doesn't take much time to set someone on a straight path, and leadership isn’t a problem. The other two aren’t as good for leadership, aren’t convenient, aren’t fast, and aren’t as effective. Also I know from experience that if you want to serve your lord, then your leaders are really good at motivating others. So I don’t think that setting these people on the right path would be hard. All this is why I believe this is the best method.
In conclusion, religious war is a huge problem we need to combat, although we think we're fine we need to be ready, even if you aren’t religious. We all need to step up to make sure that us and our peers don’t stray down the wrong path. Because with the way the world is going, we need to be united, help each other, strive for a better world, and a better us. Let's try to prevent religious war.
Works Cited
EQ What were the causes and effects of the Crusades?, https://www.wsfcs.k12.nc.us/cms/lib/NC01001395/Centricity/Domain/6742/Crusades%20powerpoint.pdf. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Crawford, Paul, and Edward Gibbon. “Siege of Acre (1291).” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Siege_of_Acre_(1291). Accessed 29 June 2022.
“Crusades.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Crusades. Accessed 29 June 2022.
“The Crusades.” Documentary Heaven, https://documentaryheaven.com/the-crusades/. Accessed 29 June 2022.
“Crusades - The results of the Crusades | Britannica.” Encyclopedia Britannica, https://www.britannica.com/event/Crusades/The-results-of-the-Crusades. Accessed 29 June 2022.
“The Crusades: Why The World Still Lives In Their Shadow.” HistoryExtra, 13 November 2019, https://www.historyextra.com/period/medieval/crusades-what-legacy-historians-how-affect-religion-today/. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Fore, William F. “Chapter 5: Worldviews in Conflict – Religion Online.” Religion Online, https://www.religion-online.org/book-chapter/chapter-5-worldviews-in-conflict/. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Gregg, Heather Selma. “The causes of religious wars : holy nations, sacred spaces, and religious revolutions.” DSpace@MIT, https://dspace.mit.edu/handle/1721.1/16639. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Gregory, Pope. “ANSWERING ISLAM: Crusades: Christian Holy War or Delayed Response?” Christian Publishing House Blog, 8 July 2019, https://christianpublishinghouse.co/2019/07/08/answering-islam-crusades-christian-holy-war-or-delayed-response/. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Hogenberg, Frans. “European wars of religion.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/European_wars_of_religion. Accessed 29 June 2022.
“Lecture 25: The Holy Crusades.” The History Guide, http://www.historyguide.org/ancient/lecture25b.html. Accessed 29 June 2022.
“Lord Edward's crusade.” Wikipedia, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lord_Edward%27s_crusade. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Watkins, James A. “Holy Crusades.” HubPages, 25 February 2019, https://discover.hubpages.com/religion-philosophy/Holy-Crusades. Accessed 29 June 2022.
Credit to Jaco Reyneke from “Saint Enoch's Presbyterian church” who gave some good info, here is our conversation:
Hello, my name is Daniel Willis. I am a student at Tauranga Boys College. I am a part of an Inquiry Learning Programme where we look into problems in New Zealand or around the world. In our inquiries we focus on answering a fertile question, and important people in churches I thought you could help. So you know I will also contact other churches in order to have a variety of answers. My fertile question is: How do we prevent religious war? If you could give your view on this and also, what is your view on religious war?
Jaco’s answer
Hi Daniel
Good luck with your inquiry.
In my view:
There is no justification for religious war.
Although it is much more complex than that, religious wars would probably be prevented if:
Religions (leaders within the religion) work hard to prevent members to become radicalised in their doctrine.
Members of religions truly buy into their teachings. At the heart of most religions, you will find teachings like loving people, caring for the disadvantaged and living ethical lives.
Governments and society should not exclude or deprive religions of having a voice.