Recently my car was broken into and robbed, and my laptop computer and a briefcase were stolen.

My initial reaction was one of shock, closely followed by anger at the inconvenience of losing a lot of very important documents in my briefcase,
I reported the robbery to the police, and was treated extremely well, but given little hope of any recovery of my briefcase. The documents in the briefcase were of no value to anyone else except me.

I started to hope that the thief would be caught and punished, and that maybe even some bad luck would go their way. I wanted them to be punished in some way.

After I calmed down, I realized that this attitude of “getting square”, or arranging a “payback” is not a productive way to go.

More importantly, this tendency in human thinking to repay evil with evil is an attribute that we often equate with the action of God in the ways of justice.
If someone does something wrong, God will notice this, punish them and “get square”.

Hence we have the concept of God being a judging God, who incidentally will always judge our enemies and right the wrongs they do to us. This concept is heavily ingrained in our culture.

Years ago when my mother would experience bad luck, she would glibly observe that “I must have killed a Chinaman!” While it would not be culturally correct to make such observation today, it is based on the belief that a judging God will always get square and punish in some way.

This is where theology becomes extremely important, and is not just some nice conversation that people with nothing else to do engage in. If we have a view of God that God is the supreme judge who will right all the wrongs, and punish the evildoers, then it is a very small step for us to take on that same role of judging and punishing.

Everyone has a view of what and who God is. Even the atheist who proclaims they don’t believe in God has already defined the view of God they don’t believe in!

It seems to me that the view that a lot of us have of God borders on a judging and even vengeful God, which for many is a difficult concept to make relevant.

I believe this is the basis of religion becoming a major source of man's inhumanity to man, and even suffering in the world today. This is particularly so when I view my own religious view as being always right, and any differing view as being wrong, and therefore should be opposed as such and punished.

For better or for worse religion as such is one of the most powerful sources for good or evil in our world today.

It is very important that each of us develop a healthy religious view of the world about us that is both productive and healthy for all concerned.

Bad, misguided religion that wants God to judge and bash up those who harm us in any way, or are even different to us, is a manipulation of God and not genuine religion.