The importance of being tolerant

Several years ago, a friend came back from an interfaith discussion on campus. I asked him how it went, and he replied that everyone basically sat around carping about how terrible Christians were, apparently because Christianity espoused the view that it is the only true religion, the only path to salvation. Some might argue that this criticism is especially targeted toward Christianity because of the privileged place it has held in American society. But this is true no longer. Recently, several colleges, including Tufts and Middlebury, have moved against campus Christian groups that prohibited homosexuals from being officers in the groups. But who's being intolerant here? This column is not about the rightness or wrongness of the Christian claim. But if we at Princeton are able to expunge the insidious influence of pluralism and move toward a true religious tolerance, we can avoid the excesses of other campuses.

What some pluralists seem to be saying is that Christians can only be 'tolerant' if they do not believe that Christianity is the only correct path to salvation. For them, tolerance is the belief that all religions are paths to salvation. But even if pluralists agree that Christianity is just one path to salvation among many, they disagree with Christianity's claim that it is the one true religion. On this count, they believe Christians in fact to be wrong. That occasions true tolerance. All religions, whether pluralistic or exclusivist, claim to be right in some respect in which others are wrong. Pluralism claims that the exclusivity of some religions is wrong. Is this not just another form of religious superiority? Pluralists would have all people somehow be true to themselves, keeping their own religious traditions. But when a religious tradition indicates that it is the only way to salvation, it must discard that part of its belief system.

How exactly is that being true to oneself then? In a recent editorial in Time magazine, Michael Kinsley notes that "ecumenism goes beyond a simple agreement to disagree in peace or even a commitment to look for areas of shared belief. Ecumenism celebrates religious belief in the abstract. And that is the puzzle. Why is erroneous belief preferred over nonbelief?" Why indeed. Without making a judgment on the truth of any particular religion, if a religion believed that I, as a non-believer, was in danger of the fires of Hell, I would find it natural for them to share their message with me. Of course, I would hope that they would do this in a considerate, non-coercive way. If people truly believe that their religion is right, and others are wrong, they have a moral obligation to try to share their religion. Not to do so would in fact be inconsiderate.

Of course, all of my arguments are based on the religion itself, rather than its followers. Conversion is a valid aspect of a religion. It's the method that can be called into question. But the wrongs of the followers and the actual religion are two different things. An inability to separate the two is a dangerous handicap. Coerced conversions, or those made with false pretenses, if they actually do occur, are the result of wrong-headed followers rather than the religion itself, and I would be hesitant to draw any conclusions about Christianity from such acts. Likewise, I refuse to draw conclusions about Hinduism from the bands of Hindus in India who go around attacking Christian missionaries and terrorizing Christian organizations or condemn Islam because of the actions of the Taliban.

True tolerance is the ability to say, "You think my religion is wrong, and I think yours is wrong. I do not believe that your religion leads to salvation, and I will do my utmost to convince you of that in an earnest, non-coercive way. And I expect you to do the same." This is the only way we will be able to live together on a diverse campus and in a diverse society. Justin Hastings is a Wilson School major from Bedford, Mass. He can be reached at justinh@princeton.edu.