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The hosts of Scared Horizons discuss why the study of religion should be a required course for all students. They believe it provides exposure, knowledge, and collective consciousness. Each host shares their personal religious background, including beliefs in spiritualism, Christianity with a twist, Christian upbringing, and Jewish upbringing. They also discuss their experiences learning about other religions and the importance of broadening their worldview. Hey guys, welcome back to Scared Horizons. I'm Mabel. I'm Noah. I'm Cheyenne. I'm Grayson. And on today's episode, we're going to be talking about why should the study of religion be a required course for all J&E students. Well, the student body at James Madison University should be required to take a study of a religion class because of the exposure it provides while surrounded by others, the extension of knowledge one can give, and the collective consciousness that one can form from knowledge. And if tradition is why students might want to be drawn to the class in the first place, why not make religion a required course for all J&E students? Exactly, exactly. So when we're talking about this topic of why should the study of religion be a required course, I think we definitely all came to the agreement that we believe for many different reasons that a course similar to this should be required not just for sociology majors, but definitely for all students. And we agreed it would be very beneficial for the student body because of what each student can gain and take away with them. Yeah, I agree. And so I think in addition to that, all of our own personal religions kind of play into why we believe what we believe and that all of our own personal religions kind of led us to this decision. Even though we all have different background religions, the fact that we can all come together to agree that this is a class that should be taught to everyone at JMU I think really says something about the class. And I think Cheyenne, you should start by telling us your personal biography. Definitely. So going with that, I was not raised in any traditional religion. I didn't grow up within a community that shared my beliefs or a church that I went to every Sunday. My parents definitely raised me to believe in spiritualism, where there is power and energy in almost everything that we're able to do. It had a huge impact, I feel like, on the respect that I have for most religions to not immediately disregard something that looks or seems different from my beliefs. And that was kind of just how I was brought up in my household. It kind of sounds like Reiki kind of gave you a spiritual thing. Is that how it felt? Reiki definitely involved spiritualism, but it wasn't anything like that growing up for me. Basically, what my parents had taught me to believe comes from a form of Christianity, where we still believe in God, we still believe in Jesus, we still believe in a lot of the things that most Christians do. However, going off of that with a spin, they taught me to believe in guides and spirits, and they taught me to believe that each one of us has nine guides for the nine purposes that we all share. That's what I was taught to believe. And then that everything has energy and everything has a purpose. There's a purpose for everything. Do you want to take it off, Mabel? Oh yeah, of course. So I'm kind of very different from your growing up aspects of life. I was born in a Christian household. I was very involved in the church, but I really didn't claim God as my own. I just went there because my friends were there and I had grown up with them. But through my sophomore year of high school, I went through a very depressive stage. Then COVID hit my junior year, and then I went on a week hiatus to really find this God that people have been talking about. People were like, oh, he'll never leave you, he won't forsake you. And I was like, oh, I feel like he has, because why would he let me go through all of this? The next year, my bio mom died a month before beginning college, and I just felt so broken. Somehow, God was my strength. So I fell off my Christianity grind trying to please everybody in my life. Because it's just JMU. You party, you do this, you do that. Absolutely. It was crazy. I accidentally overdosed on about 1,600 milligrams of marijuana that was accidentally laced with fentanyl. And in that trance, I know, it was actually very insane. And mind you, I'm a tiny little girl. So the fact that that amount of... This was freshman year for you? This was freshman year. The fact that that was so much, it was just a lot. It was a lot at that time. But I went through a trance, and the Lord showed me what hell, I defined it as hell, what hell would look like if I kept playing with my faith. So the EMT was called. I was nonverbal. I wasn't answering anything. I was just me the whole entire time. And the only thing that I could respond to, which was, I think, interherent, but I think that's a sign, was that this time it will be different. So I then dissociated from my body for three days. I didn't know what was going on around the world. If you ever saw Get Out, have y'all seen Get Out? Yeah. It was like I was in that sunken place looking through my eyes, like behind my brain. I was there. So the Lord saved me, and I'm taking this time seriously. I said it will be different. I'm making sure it's different. And, you know, that's my background story. I heard that you grew up in a Methodist family. So, Grayson, would you tell us a little bit more about that? Yeah, I grew up in a very, very religious Southern Methodist family. Like since the moment I was born, it's been God. Pretty much, I went to preschool at my church, then after that I went to the same private Christian school from kindergarten until high school. So I think it turned out 16 years. And while I was at Christian school, they still made a point that we learned about other religions. So it kind of gave me a different, like a broader view, just because they wanted us to know how to not turn other people to Christianity, but, like, educate them with Christianity. So we had to learn about all the different religions. Do you think, like, being raised in a really Christian-heavy-centric, like, I guess, area of education, like, affected your worldview? Oh, 100%. 100%. Like, I don't have to sound like I'm burned out about it, but after 16 years, I volunteered at the church. I ran Sunday school with my mom. I was so biased on everything. And I didn't realize that until I got to college, because growing up with the same 50 people in your same class every year, you kind of don't really get, like, a big experience. But once you get to college, it was like a slap in the face. I kind of just realized how biased my, like, worldview was. Yeah, I get that. When you say that, do you, like, feel proud of that community, or that you're thankful for that? I'm actually thankful for it. But, like, I'm still a diehard Christian. I just think that at certain points, it was just being less about, like, trying to show me the Lord and more just, like, try forcing it and, like, not going at your own pace. Yeah. I just think it needs to be more, like, you-centered than, like, you have to go do this at church at 6 p.m. on a Sunday night. Or you're not adhering to your faith. Yeah. So, Noah, I heard you were also raised religious, right? Well, kind of. A little bit. So I was raised in a Jewish household in the conservative branch of Judaism. And conservative is kind of the middle branch of Judaism, where it's not as lax of a foreign branch, but it's not as extreme as the Orthodox branch. And so I, like, growing up until 10th grade, I went to Hebrew school multiple times a week. I had my bar mitzvah, I read the Torah, and I went to synagogue and other Jewish holidays. I wasn't going for every Shabbat every day, but I'm the big one to get my family to go. However, as I've grown up, I've started to kind of distance myself from the major ideas of the conservative branch of Judaism. I grew up keeping kosher in my household. So we had, like, two sets of silverware and two sets of plates, which just became a lot. So I would definitely consider myself Jewish, but even though Judaism is a more marginalized religion, I've kind of learned about the other religions on my own. And as they're more common in history, so I feel like I overall have a pretty broad view of religion overall. But I would still consider myself Jewish, because even though I might not believe in all of the Jewish traditions, like, I don't believe in God, but I would still consider myself Jewish. And I think other members of the Jewish community would also consider themselves Jewish as well. That is so cool. You said that you went to learn about different religions. What prompted that decision? Well, actually, as part of one of my Hebrew school projects in eighth grade, one of the things we did was we went to other places of worship, which was Hebrew. We went to a Buddhist temple, we went to a Methodist church, and I believe we went to another Catholic church. And also, you're kind of forced to learn about other religions, I guess, as a Jewish person, because all the other religions are around you so much that you kind of just pick up on them. Yeah, that's really interesting. I had a similar experience, because my church, they, once, in the Methodist church, when you are going to sixth grade, you have to get confirmed into the church. And to get confirmed, they go to a lock-in, and the night lock-in, you go to synagogue. And so, we had to go to a Jewish synagogue, sit through the whole service, Torah, where the amifas, the whole nine yards. So they would, like, try and... I can't really think of the word, but they were trying to educate you on all the other types of religion. That's really cool to hear about the experience coming from someone like... I didn't go to church at all. I wasn't raised to have to do that, not even for holidays, not even for Christmas or Easter. And so, the biggest, like, experience and exposure that I have with churches, is even just seeing them on TV and in movies, and hearing the differences, and it's really cool. Welcome to Primary Choices. So, I just want to talk about what religion is. You know, we've been talking about it for a long time, and we haven't given a definition to it. So, chapter one of our book, Religion in a Sociological Perspective, says that religion is substantive. It's functional, it's symbolic, it's invisible, lived and spiritual, but not religious. There's so many ways of what we could define religion to be. But we know from our favorite Keeping It 101, they say that religion is what people do. You know, what do you do on a day-to-day basis? What influences you? And what motivates you to do what you do? Berger once said that religion is becoming something that is diminished in its importance in both society and consciousness. Which is really scary, because we see this thing as very important, but for some reason, it's being diminished. It's not being seen as important as it is. It's not being talked about. That's why we say that religion should be something that is talked about through, you know, college and JMU and all of that. And you know that religion is all around you. You know it, you see it. We said the Pledge of Allegiance and all of that in, you know, primary school. And if you ignore it, it means that you are ignoring a lot of other possibilities. College is a place to explore who you are, and religion is something that you might want to explore if you've never been, you know, seen to it or allotted the time to look at it. But I just want to talk about how experiencing religion in an adolescent form can, what's it called, help you grow into a more solidified religious person. So Cheyenne, I just want to ask you a question. Do you think that if you were introduced to religion in your younger age that it would deteriorate your path of life? I mean, I definitely feel like it would affect it. I don't necessarily know that I believe that it would change all that much just because I feel like my values and beliefs would probably stay the same just along with what I do believe. But if I had more of a community, I feel like that would definitely make me feel more comfortable, especially with where I live. But I was a military brat. I moved around all the time, so it was better to have more of that individual relationship with my faith. And I thought it worked best for me. But it probably would have affected it. Absolutely. Yeah. Thank you so much for sharing about that. That's honestly why we decided to say that college is just the perfect time to get to know about the different things that are all around you. I mean, you can go to college to widen your mind, to focus on what you want to focus, but we have these gen eds and we have to take them. Well, a religion course should be one of those things that you should take just to explore, to widen your mind. And Shannon, I think you had a little bit more to say about that. Yeah, so I wanted to definitely bring up the reasons why I feel like it should be a required class. It's just mostly focusing on the togetherness. It brings the collective consciousness to respect what we do not understand. And it brings to light a better reasoning to not dismiss the unknown right away. So my upbringing has led me to automatically not assume or judge anyone else's preference, difference in opinions, religious practices, or customs and cultures, just because I already felt like mine was a concept that was pretty far out there. And because of this, I noticed not everyone took this stance as well. Yeah. I believe that a class studying religion will help alleviate a lot of prejudgments and misconceptions about what religion is and what they do. If someone does not understand something, they are quick to throw it away or dismiss the idea altogether. But instead, the process should be to educate and expand one's knowledge to help better the community and society, but also gain an appreciation for what they did not know. It all ties together. For real. It does. It all ties together. And we as a society have already started this as a practice and have grown a collective consciousness from it. It is the differences in beliefs and values in which we behave that create a society away from justice. And then, going based off of that, I believe that religion has truth and it is grounded in that, and the beliefs are shared. But why? Is it the comfort that one gets from having a religion? Is it the community one is surrounded by? Or are we afraid to stray away from tradition? That's a really important question. Sorry, but yeah, I think that's a really important idea that I think this class really covers. It's why it is so important to learn religion, which I think also is why this class is so important for everyone to be taking. Absolutely, absolutely. It definitely covers all grounds. And according to Durkheim, religion is a system of practices and shared beliefs. It is considered under rights in which the group studies and continuously does, it must contain sacred things, meaningful objects, and faith is one to express the religion freely. To humanity, it must be visible with no preconceived ideas so that the judgment of past and present forms of religion are fairly assessed. Durkheim also expresses just how every religion and characteristic is off the notion of the supernatural, which is something that I was raised with. And so that is something that I kind of do agree along with, which goes beyond our understanding, going beyond human intellect, showing the sign of mystery and the unknown, which is how religion came to be by giving the space to express the inexpressible. Something interesting I think you just brought up is the idea of the supernatural, where a lot of religions have the idea of a supernatural element, but a lot of them don't identify it as supernatural. It's like a god, the idea of a god is inherently supernatural. So I think the fact that your religion acknowledges the fact that it is another whole entity, I think is super interesting and really helps differentiate it. Absolutely. And I feel like the reason why religion is grounded in truth is because it was created in such a way where it could not be denied to those who believed in it and created it. It is a whole belief structure where even if you did not agree or trust in everything about the religion, what the religion expresses, you can still relate to it and it can still affect your own beliefs and outcomes. When the religion has been created and formed, and whatever practices it chooses to share, it will collectively bring people together in a space and mindset where its main goal works off a shared belief, which is what I feel like I missed out on back to your question about community. Yeah, and I just wanted to ask you a question. Do you feel as now that you're grown in your emerging adulthood phase of life, do you feel like you can find that community in other things, or are you still okay with that independence of your faith? I feel like I have had to learn to be okay with the independence. It is hard to find community. I mean, speaking religiously, I haven't found it. And it's still something, even in adulthood, I have yet to find. But that's just because I feel like it's something that's not really talked about, like you said, that's supernatural to things, and that's something that really my family believes in. And I haven't found anybody else that really connects along those lines. Yeah. But I'm okay with it. That's good. And there is comfort in knowing others are out there that are like you and similar in the ways that they share beliefs and practices of what you do. Therefore, it gives a sense of belonging and inherently creates a community one can feel comfortable in. And because I moved around a lot, it didn't really affect me. Yeah. So the religious beliefs that a group has also can create customs and cultures that surround its community, and sometimes that's enough to have traditions start to form, which can also be hard to leave, which I can acknowledge that. I believe that I think it was Hart that discussed this in lecture with how with enough time the community can build and become so integrated in one's life that even if one does not share any beliefs with this found religion, they still decide to stay based off the connections they have already made and raised in their family for the safety aspect. Children raised in communities that show that they are connected have higher chances of sharing this belief and continuing it on as well as furthering the tradition. I think that's pretty cool. I think that we do a lot of things day to day just because we have to. We wake up. We brush our teeth. We go to class. Whatever we do, we go to work just because we have to. I think figuring out the reason why we do those things is very important to make what we do worth it. We're adapting, but we're making everything we do have some type of symbol. Brayson, can you please talk more about just your primary sources? Okay. Something that I believe in a lot is that religion is a major part of everyday life, whether you know it or not. Walking down the street, especially in rural Virginia, there is a million churches. There is this town where I live called Bowling Green. I think it's a town of 5,000 people. The actual town is maybe a few miles long. It's 50 churches. I don't know if it's a bias for how I was raised. I was raised to see the beauty of God in everything around me. But every time I walk down the road here, you see all the churches. You look up the mountains. You're like, that's what God created. That's how I've always viewed it. I know it's how other people view it because I also am a big believer that religion can be a gateway to other cultures. Because back home, my real job is construction management. One of my coworkers, he's this man from El Salvador. He's a Roman Catholic. One day, we were just talking about God. He was like, all right, I'm having this thing at my church. It's an international church. There's people from Dutch, or not Dutch, the Netherlands, Germany, Peru, just a bunch of different places. He's like, we're having this party for New Year's. He's like, come by. Come get all this different food. That was all because we were talking about religion. That just taught me a lot more. I think it's beneficial for everyone to learn about religion because I think there's just so many cultures in this world that revolve around religion. Over in Asia, you have Buddhism and Hindu. Then you have Christianity. In Europe, you have all these different variations. I just think that the more you learn about religion, the more you're exposed to different cultures, and the more your horizons are broadened, pretty much. Absolutely. I definitely do. I feel like that would have been a connection you wouldn't have otherwise without the baseline of talking about religion. Even though it was an international church, it was bringing in around a lot of culture. I also believe that religion, when studied at its core in pursuit of fundamental truth, generally provides individuals with a sense of intellectual enlightenment and everyday well-being. Most religious practices offer structures for individuals to follow in their daily lives, which can benefit them immensely, regardless of their attachment to said practices. Studying these can offer a wide sense of understanding of cultures vastly different from our own. Something I wanted to focus on is about how different people can practice the same religion differently. Obviously, we have five major religions that we've learned about, but within those five major religions, there are so many different sects of that religion within it. I think that taking a religion class is so important because it educates you that there's so much further beyond these five big parties. I think, again, what you said, Grayson, about how learning about all these different interlocking sects within these religions can help expand your insight to different cultures. Obviously, different groups of people who practice the same religion but different parts of the religion are going to progress differently, are going to act differently. I think learning about all of them, because there are so many different types of Catholicism and Christianity that I was not aware of, especially as a Jewish person who wasn't learning about them naturally. I think it's so important that we do have a class to learn about all these extra types and about what their values are and how we can use that to interact with people in real life. Because a lot of conflict that does occur around the world is because of religion. I think one of the best ways to stop the conflict is to further educate ourselves about religion and why people are practicing the things that they are. Truly, I fully believe with you in that. I think there's this sense of freedom regarding the right to worship, practice belief, have shared opinions and customs. Meaning they have a right to have a choice in what someone wants to expand their knowledge on, which has not always been the case. Especially when known religions were fewer in quantity and the communities were a lot larger. I think back to the Catholicism, how it ruled almost all of Europe way back when, I think in the 5th century. And if you did not share those same beliefs, it was easy to be shunned. Now there is this enlightenment knowing that you can be open with what you believe, knowing some people may or may not like it. And that's perfectly okay. They get to seek out their own truth, exploring the unknown, how they wish. All while offering structure, which has been known to be beneficial towards humanity and has a purpose to thrive more in. Exactly. I agree. I think that's a really good point about how people interact with each other and how we don't necessarily have to agree with each other. We do have to respect each other and show peace to each other. Because at the end of the day, we're all just trying to find what makes sense to us and what helps us feel better. And I feel like that definitely brings us together as a community. Exactly. Alright guys, now wrapping it up, bringing it right back to why we are starting and having this podcast in the first place. Believing that this should be a requirement. There is more and more expansion on what religion is. Different routes to how people come and go from it. And even Weber has argued that it is here and apparent. It's not going anywhere anytime soon. So it is best to study it from every angle possible. This has gained intellectual and cultural consciousness in society. And cultural appreciation for what was unknown to most is now having more and more information out there on this topic. With different viewpoints, there would not be so much attention on religion. The purpose of what it can do for individuals and how communities can bring in more awareness. I found this really interesting quote. And I feel like it really stuck with me when just talking about this topic that the knowledge and belief dimensions are clearly related since knowledge of a belief is a necessary precondition for its acceptance. However, belief need not follow from knowledge, nor does all religious knowledge bear on belief. Furthermore, a man may hold a belief without really understanding it. That is, belief can exist on the basis of very little knowledge. That comes from Stark and Glock. That's amazing. I just want to piggyback and round off of that. Belief can exist on the basis of very little knowledge. As 17, 18 year olds coming into college, we just believe anything that's given to us. We are stuck on our phone. We're scrolling. They say, oh, put a ginger in your tooth to make you grow five inches. Whatever the case may be, you just believe it. And you have no knowledge of it. So college is a breeding ground for knowledge to turn into intellect. College is a breeding ground for just knowing a little bit more about everything. Why not know more about religion, which is all around you? Exactly. And I feel like that when we're going based off the belief, it's really what brought us to this class. It's what brought us to knowing and wanting to learn more about religion. But I think with the expansion of knowledge, that's really where we can start to build that community that everybody talks about. It's where we can start to appreciate other cultures. And that wouldn't have happened without a class like this being required. I think what you said, it's like a rhyme, college is for knowledge. I agree. Now is the time to expand your knowledge about other cultures. And I think taking a religion class is a really simple, easy way to do that. I think what you're saying, college is the perfect time of your life to really find out what you are looking for in terms of religion, worldview, and just other stuff you do. And I just think that's why a perfect reason that religion should be required for students at JMU, just because it introduces you to such a different perspective on life. And I just don't see any negative parts of that. Well, thanks for listening to our podcast. It's... Say No to Religion! Thanks and see you next time.
