How did a religion that began with a focus on kindness, service and gentleness -- unselfishness -- become so preoccupied with the most selfish of all actions: saving one's own soul and getting into heaven?
et lux perpetua luceat eis!
Cum sanctis tuis in aeternum,
quia pius es.
Give them eternal rest, Lord,
and shine eternal light upon them!
With thy saints forever,
for Thou art good.
quia pius es -- for thou art good.
pius = dutiful, conscientious; godly, holy; good, upright (Collins Latin Dictionary).
pious = devoutly religious; making a hypocritical display of virtue; dutiful or loyal [archaic] (New Oxford American Dictionary).
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It was, of course, Christ's own church that corrupted his message. By the Middle Ages, the Holy Roman Catholic Church was telling its members that, if they didn't follow the church's dictates, they would burn in hell. They were damned by original sin, and the path to heaven lay through the Church: prayer, ritual, and giving one's assets to the Church, rather than by service to one's fellow beings and giving directly to the poor. The Church accumulated land, gold and power. The poor and powerless sank into ignorance and misery, comforted with the promise of eternal life with all God's saints, if and only if the Church interceded with Him for them.
Then, flickers of light with Gutenberg and Luther. Literacy, the right to read God's word oneself, the right to pray directly to Him without earthly or saintly intermediaries. Renaissance. Enlightenment. Intelligence seen as a gift from God, rather than a tool of Satan.
Progress, the end of slavery, the right of people to rule themselves -- eventually all people, regardless of race, religion, gender, or sexual orientation.
And today? What a wonderful and terrible world! There are lots of people who are pious in the original way -- dutiful, good, kind, generous, loving. And there are a lot whose piety is no more than a hypocritical display of virtue. Churches that serve God by serving the poorest and weakest among us, and churches that serve only the powerful, and themselves.
If only all Christians would stop worrying about saving their own butts and getting into heaven ... and simply strive to be pius.
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