Daily Prompt – ‘Polite Company’

“It’s never a good idea to discuss religion or politics with people you don’t really know.” Agree or disagree?

Agree, absolutely. For starters, why does anyone need to know about your religion? I believe that religion is something personal and spiritual – some people have it, some people don’t, and that’s fine. No-one needs to talk about religious beliefs, there just isn’t a need for it – it should be something that means a lot to you, something you hold dear and can’t imagine being without – even for atheists. I’m an atheist and I feel that my beliefs, and the reasons for them, are personal to me. Why would you deliberately set out to start a conversation where your beliefs are likely to not just be criticised, but ritually torn to shreds? It just doesn’t make sense to me. 

As for politics… discussing it with people you know well can make for lively debate, keeps a good interest in current affairs and can be fun – I always have political conversations around the dinner table with my family when I go home from uni – but with people you’ve just met? No way! That’s a definite no-no. I saw this in a personal statement I once looked over for someone; they were quite defiantly feminist and incredibly pro-gay rights, and whilst I wouldn’t dismiss their application based on their political beliefs (I agree with equality for everyone regardless of sexuality, and whilst I’m not a modern feminist, I don’t hate people who are), it’s the attitude that would get me. So if you’re a bit pushy with your political views – having a bumper sticker that says “Honk if you hate abortion”, or are constantly attached to your picket sign -, discussing them with a new acquaintance is not the best idea. In fact, regardless of your views, just don’t discuss them – it’ll work out better in the long run.

Slacking….

First things first, happy Easter to you all! If you’re religious, I hope you enjoy your day doing whatever it is you do (I’m not clued up on religious traditions), if you’re not, enjoy your chocolate! I get my easter eggs tomorrow because I’m busy today, but I hope you all enjoy your day.

This is another apology, I’ve really been neglecting my blog this past week. In fairness, I do think I have an excuse – I’m still ill, and really haven’t felt like blogging at all this week until now, when I thought it best I leave you this quick note to apologize. I will be back to my prolific-blogger-best before long, I promise, but for now I just need the time to recover, so thanks for understanding and sticking by me 🙂

Maddy x

Writing Religion!

Yes, it’s another post about one of the themes that is touched upon in quite a lot of pieces of writing. I deal somewhat with religion in my stories, although I’m always quite anxious about causing offence – and I don’t want my views to be forced onto the reader, or for all of the characters to share my religious views, which I think can come across a bit preachy if you do that and have them mentioning it so frequently.

I’m an atheist. I’m accepting of other people’s religions and faiths, but I, personally, don’t believe in God or anything. I’d like to think I’m a spiritualist, but really, I don’t want to label myself as anything because my views change so frequently depending on my mood. Sometimes, I am a spiritualist (a non-Christian one, I must add), but other times, I consider myself to be very much irreligious. I don’t think about it all that much because religion really isn’t a big part of my life. I don’t pray, I don’t worship – it just isn’t something that is ever on my mind, other than when I’m writing.

Due to the nature of my story – it deals with an afterlife that isn’t heaven – most of my characters end up with “uncertain” religious beliefs – regardless of what they believed in life, they aren’t sure anymore. One of my characters, although this isn’t mentioned, would have been a Pagan-type religion during his life because of the time he was alive. Another was an atheist born to an incredibly strict Catholic family, which was one of the major contributing factors to her death. The main female character is the one with whom I refer to religion the most, because she does end up questioning her beliefs – she was a firm Christian, but ends up questioning everything due to what happens to her. As for the rest of them, I haven’t really given it much thought – I suppose there will have been some who were religious due to their place/time of birth, others who would or wouldn’t have been religious through choice and so on.

I think it’s quite important, as I said, to make sure you don’t push your beliefs onto others, which is why I was very careful when dealing with the main female character questioning her beliefs. As an atheist, I didn’t want to just say “and suddenly she didn’t believe in God anymore” (mainly because that isn’t how I write, but also because it would seem too jumpy and sudden), and I definitely don’t portray any religion or lack of religion as more truthful than the others from a narrator’s point of view – some of the characters are firm in their beliefs and others are wavering. Instead, I made it seem as though her faith was being worn down, but she still retains some of it, and will do for the remainder of the series, because I think that’s important – I don’t want this impression being given that when bad things happen to people, they immediately decide that there isn’t a God and never believe again. I think most people question their beliefs at some point or another, and then it’s up to that person whether that questioning simply reaffirms their faith, or leads them to change their beliefs.

I think one problem I have in the story is demonizing Catholicism – I strongly disagree with some of their views, and I tried not to let that come across in the story, but the fact of the matter is that with one of the characters, her parents’ strict ways were mainly influenced by their devout Catholicism, and that is what lead to her death. I don’t want to convey the idea that Catholicism is responsible for murdering one of the characters, because it isn’t – she killed herself, and her parents were incredibly strict and took their religion too far, and it was only one of the contributing factors towards the way they behaved towards her – so I think, during editing, I may tone down the mentions towards the Catholic faith in that chapter, so that it is still there – because it is incredibly important still – but perhaps not as extreme as it was.

Religion in writing can be an absolute minefield – you have to tiptoe around so many things to avoid setting off a minefield of offence to people, some of whom take any opportunity they can find to get offended, particularly when it comes to religion. I just hope that, should my stories get published, people will realize that I as a narrator never take a particular stance towards any religion, as I aim to be tolerant of all of them (extremists are another matter altogether, but that’s something for another day). What I do is I show the views of the characters on their religion, be they good or bad, because that is a fact of life – some people have negative views of religion, others have idyllic views of it, and I want my stories and my writing, despite being fiction, to represent real people as much as possible.