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Ranny Kang

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If the world shared a common language, would religion be obsolete?

Call me crazy, but I have this idea that all religions in essence are all the same. Through the evolution of language and culture, humans have interpreted the same idea differently in order to understand spirituality in the context of their lives and their circumstances. And as human beings, we love to label, categorize and give everything names--Christian, Muslim, Buddhist, Atheist, etc.--which eventually divides and creates the "other". What if we all shared a common language? I'm not talking English, Spanish or Chinese. I'm talking about love, transformation, peace and acceptance.

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    Amélie Gourdon 50+

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    TED TranslatorAssociate
    Aug 8 2011: Well as Chad pointed out, the English-speaking Christian world gives you a hint. Look at European religious history and how reformed churches rised from Catholicism. Nowadays Church of England followers still have a misrepresentation of catholicism, where Catholics are seen as more conservative in particular.
    Also, and perhaps more importantly than historic and modern examples, recent research in psychology highlights how as human we tend to be compelled to believe in supernatural. See Jesse Bering ("The belief instinct") for this (http://www.jessebering.com/the-belief-instinct.php). As for recknoning that generalized free-thinking would free the world of religion, it's a fallacy that we all tend to embrace: the thought that we're just humans, therefore compelled to believe, is threathening and easier to wash away by thinking it's all about culture / education / free-thinking... whatever is controllable.

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