New Year
Religion and Authority
If everybody thinks that his life is useless unless he can enjoy life as a rich man or he becomes super-rich, the world should be full of wars, armed conflicts, and clashes among nations, groups, and individuals.
If everybody is a blood-thirsty wolf, no one can even walk safely in his neighborhood. Accordingly, no one will work for petty wages, but everyone will start to attack one another to rob him of any goods. So, no production of agricultural products or industrial products would be possible. No one would go to work or school, since fights are everywhere. And thus, civilization will fall and disappear.
But, every human society has its own code of conduct and ethics. Members of the society are forced to obey rules and the norms. They are educated to respect law and order as well others. So, people come to know that there are many social and traditional conditions and requirements to fulfill if they want to be rich. Finally people will love to find and enjoy peace of mind in their humble and very humble life. Besides, even their humble society and community needs cooperation of its constituents to maintain order, provide welfare services and security, and develop economy. One example is a need to establish self-defense military to defend their territory from other tribes or nations, which requires extreme cooperation from members of the society.
But without a religion, people cannot be fully convinced that their loyalty to the authority of their society or nation is ultimately paid off. One lives and dies leaving his children and grandchildren. Everybody wants to secure family love, at least, so that his soul can rest in peace after his death. The authority of a tribe, a community, or a nation must bear responsibility in this spiritual field. So, the authority needs a religion to support themselves standing before people who live and die humbly and very humbly in most cases.
Now, the US has a strong background of religions, mostly of Christianity origin. Europe is losing the past glory of the Vatican. The Islamic world and India are under strong influences of their religions, though they are anti-Christianity and sometimes anti-Westernization. Chinese have almost no or little religion except love and respect for their ancestors. Japanese are in a very unique spiritual environment which can be itself regraded as a religion of Buddhism and shintoism origins.
Nonetheless, it is Christianity that has succeeded most in these 2000 years in the world. And as it was also 2000 years from Abraham to Christ Jesus, we may be allowed to expect something great in our era of the history.
*** APPENDIX ***
The Prophecy of the Popes, attributed to Saint Malachy, is a list of 112 short phrases in Latin. They purport to describe each of the Roman Catholic popes (along with a few anti-popes), beginning with Pope Celestine II (elected in 1143) and concluding with the successor of current pope Benedict XVI, a pope described in the prophecy as "Peter the Roman", whose pontificate will end in the destruction of the city of Rome...
"In the extreme persecution of the Holy Roman Church, there will sit [i.e., as bishop].
Peter the Roman, who will pasture his sheep in many tribulations:
and when these things are finished, the city of seven hills will be destroyed,
and the terrible judge will judge his people.
The End."
That last line of the prophecy of St. Malachy is usually interpreted as a reference to the last pope (Petrus Romanus, the last in the list), who will be very important for Catholics ("who will pasture his sheep in many tribulations"), and his pontificate will end with the destruction of Rome ("and when these things are finished, the city of seven hills will be destroyed"). However, many cities including Jerusalem and Lisbon are also known as "the city of the seven hills". And the "destruction" is not necessarily physical, it can be a economical crisis, a great decline of morality and many other things. "Petrus Romanus" doesn't necessarily refer to a pope, it can mean "St. Peter's throne in Rome", that will be empty in the end times.http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prophecy_of_the_Popes#Petrus_Romanus
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Joh 1:7 The same came for a witness, to bear witness of the Light, that all men through him might believe.
Joh 1:8 He was not that Light, but was sent to bear witness of that Light.