Allegiance

There are many religions that call for dedicated and devoted allegiance to the supreme being or gods.  We are seeing an increased number of devastating deeds where this commitment and loyalty requires hurting people and destroying those and things which oppose one’s religious standards or promote alternate activities and lifestyles.  It is unfortunate that many times throughout history the church has often fallen into this same trap of encouraging their people to express their commitment to God by performing similar devastating deeds.  It would appear that it is easy to remember Jesus’ command to love God with our whole being but easy to forget that this is inseparably coupled with the instruction to love our neighbour.  Jesus goes on to define a neighbour to include someone that we struggle to love especially those who have a different religion, different worship styles and different values. We are called to live our lives loving God and loving people.