A Word on Words; 0847; N. S. Xavier

are a word on we're delving into the world of books and their authors an eye doctor in a savior talks about two faces of religion your host for word on words mr john second part publisher of the tennessean in editorial director of usa today cleaning ladies and then once again welcome to a word on words singing out we're only talking about the subject that is of interest to millions and millions of american millions more around the world the subject of religion and art our

guest is a psychiatrist and author nsa view welcome to word on words it's great to have you here on the subject of his is religion the two faces our religion that's what the book's called and you to just begin at the beginning look upon religion as something that can both help and her something that has a healthy side and to use your words a six sided as perhaps we should begin right there because i'm sure we've already offended some people in the audience we go about the sec side of religion but in the unjust and the broad this journalism we can say religion making people are supporting people to go of cancer you had and it goes on now the agency many arts sports and daughter madeleine really is an indie event and it's a tremendous and so summits are problems either

supported or sometimes even less because religious a conflict is it is that europe is it your position that these conflicts are inherits that there are inevitable that there was no way the history and character of the religious influences that it's inevitable in the society to have that sort of that's all of the good news your sickness learn if you look at history it has been there on the time that all things can change it all things would change the government in kenmore montreux as they have they said yes we would have more health this thing is headed to a non summit six years it right well now a new wheat we talked about ireland is a republican

allen is is it's part to make apart religion and they have the catholics in the middle east today austin's and arabs muslims and jews and then you have christians and muslim customs and and then you have cities and i was in the muslim section and then if you go to other places in the world you find out other a religious conflicts lot of butlers suggest that they are that that is a basic there's also raises questions as to cure the end that's so the next step in the book cause you do point out that the healthy side of religion does offer a way to provide both health and soccer to believers cash and at the same time to provide influences that can that can help heal the

problems and then that brings us of course to to the ingredients of love right now is love and the universal and not all religions as riot girl and dr gordon tony's soon is this visit to live in this village or the vote on board it's a burden on millions and command them for blood prince said that and mine is the only animal i think is the only animal knows is known as himself what counts as part of it is the alley is not straight if it is the author is not straight man is the only animal it gets tons of friends and wrote for the government and the idea of learning on snow events that the us won so it is that it is beautiful but when it comes to writing code and a lot of religious people don't apply well larry david from a book now

to something close to the end because you have a chapter in the air in which you discuss not only the elmer gantry center on the us and close work as well and i think most of us in my generation grew up thinking about elmer gantry on i mean i will always remember the first line of the of the novel elmer gantry was wrong i've always said that's the perfect newspaper leaders first paragraph but but on monday gantry was so in a sense a fanatic that he had heard the sickness he also had a healthy side and he was a contradiction and our great contradictions and religion but i'm really fascinated as to why in this sometimes esoteric discussion of the two faces of religion you gave us that insight into gantry now is a really fascinating

and singing those views are good example of the fanatic and vector fanatics but also he has a mistake exactly that mr clinton is a mistake and there was frank scheer met who's a half baked of prison as a detainee years and going on forty what he was going in that direction and then though as a people and they david sleuth it's a beautiful depiction accounting of any other mobile an infection that have that can go for thin themselves religious spectrum well it seems to me that that elmer gantry was a product of sinclair lewis time you could write an elmer gantry book today but it would be a different elmer gantry book i mean i would anticipate in the next few years that we will see

in fiction a protest call oral roberts jimmy swaggart ernest a sleeve and jim and kenny baker not be sexist is so and i look at those televangelists and it's difficult for me to find a healthy side there and yet i know that and each one of those cases even those who have quote send close quote and confess again and quote i'm eighty nine points but even in those cases that their brand of religion has provided a crutch and i guess i would say a necessary credit to people who were reaching for something talk about that phenomenon tell and lows of a few wood inlaid into context of good and evil help in her sickness health

and it seemed to have a lot of paper to some extent they don't seem to have that sense of conflict have a need to believe in something and so there was sense of believing and a certain sense of belonging and there's no boats some of the programs so they can be quite uplifting and they care about where sure there's a kind of positive thinking and three particularly useful for people to get done and a lot of negative thinking and well it's a different type of televangelists in that it seems to me that he's really neil descendant and norman vincent peale the same time a letter that the swagger to change the label roberts wine is the leal descendant of the billy sundays and dirt and the fundamentalist church of the top ten yep i houston and of

analogy of the caterpillar naming a cocoa there is a second stage really does ok you know but what happens in the heat that you said that a good and tomato is a little bit about the best way events that stuck in that record so i think in human engineers ireland on looters elements o'hagan is the breaching a man has some benefit for some people is saying that some people need a non bad but that that they can relate to it it may be better than having now kind of belief system would be caught totally confused and partly selfish so heating cemented hitting another group yeah i'm feeling better about oneself it's not only healthy but

did maybe it one step for some people i know are people who have given out alcoholism or wife abuser other thing ms mcpherson has held for an omniscient and preaching sometimes it's just placed them and undid that you get scared of lynda hallinan and they make some changes but then it did maybe only ones to help them if they get those sonnets over and that's a pretty odd a complex of our being the route closed in indiana and then that many looking down on other people and so on this too not that to make german there's been survey but it's better than an hors d'oeuvre before yes well i am i take you to that subject on one hate to lead you into the subject of love you and i know that there is a very heavy complement and in the book

that deals with have a couple of thought the deals with the different aspects of a beloved some of which i had not considered before i had not thought for example of the survey a caring person is loving person by not both here necessary and in and low and loving sense care and in some ways is considered a responsibility a duty and obligation to law as opposed to at giving for charity or for our terrorism or her a gift or a lot and we talk a little bit about that that dynamic of love that as it relates to religion of low energy and that

one of your of of the levin center based on the basic elements of love and candied lemon big love and the team has been much covered and close friends and veterans and sometimes on the nano scale aspect and responsibly to basic to iraq ends of plummeting off thick air campaign in terms of messaging and the spontaneity maybe in the sense of duty as he mentioned on a minute concert depot our disney lot of responding to the other person's need and i said the example in the bible all four of these were some adult in the temple priest and a prius as a team and when pie and didn't do anything to the foreground our said there may have been going and doing their duty when the roadsides and then by andy here responded to the need of the fellow human being in him will meet

so that showed a deeper love and uncaring and they're so there's the tender kid and the more they love them all every kid in the mall vietnam actually not sending not now not only of the immediate family of four others in the lake in front of most outstanding example now deny that that is a tender loving watch is blowing because she's some want to be at and that guy that's deep state senate even his television and it is a coat ended sievers has so i think it is the greatest of kings of undergrowth and walkman a sober subject in most cases the confessional loving cruz has died you've you quote of bertrand russell

as saying religion is a disease borne of the year and the untold source of misery well if you look at the negative side of allegiance to the organization does you're barred but that is on the one side of this dog he only saw that one side an interesting to me that he was a nonbeliever as early in life as he was his parents were both either agnostic or atheist with him in many situations said you're not both could relate odd children who are raised in that environment i have rebelled against it and embraced a religious faith ms casey was so true to the book believes or in this case an anomaly of his of his parents and he looked on religion

as a as a negative force of course if you've worn out there was that downside that sickness that as a foot deep about you mentioned mother theresa's grand isle and you say she is a classic example of a caring love what about the leader of her church how would you characterize the pope in terms of being at sea so if you say should characterize the villagers believe now which you write does the common folk singing actually the same people save mother i said that and reminds me of former ireland that teases a month a little addicted

mothers to new york on monday newspapers in my monitor and then this as a human led to a victim of a lot of the show and he was telling me casually that they are talking about a man that there's a narrow minded it in my military and in our division board when the court supported and these members and why that and you know and even people on the streets to live healthy and they get into administrative position seems to let you know that it just a loving ms irvin one of forces that don't have particularly good minister decided to ban on renowned business that as you're well argued it does take you away from drama

one recent call that pastoral duties are well let me just let me just move from the length of it to the graphic that we have them and brought along because there's love literally at at the top of the triangle and if you just just looked there maybe you can help our viewers understanding what the what that and he wondered if you're saying that you're going to have this bitter do shows these iconic then having them for the low cut ways and caution caution our fortunes that is healthy anxiety and wisdom babies don't want them in this town the balance between the rational and the intuitive side and all porn mindedness and the healthy identity a healthy identity is the mark i think that not only in that identity focused on

one senate nomination and i notice that you have caution as opposed to the year and part of that equation that's right the hairy earth tilts toward the second side that sentiment to caution would be a healthy and said to have the sense of guilt mitch is healthy but you can see on the fanatical family friends and just the opposite fusion of love you can see a lot of selfishness years and a lot of many hate it made his seventies non caring but the proper out that even a tape some elements of men and be interested in a second videotaped neighbor oneself with a lot of good men the hague of another group will you mentioned guilt you know i know that we both came up in the same tradition is a religious tradition the same ad and it has been said that that tradition

maybe one that imposes a good deal of guilt i know you've had thirty years of trying is a captain's to rid yourself of that this poor struggling learners as i've had the advantage of either the psychiatric trying not a psychiatric therapy that but you could provide now you tell me because of the catholic faith is not the only religion that imposes an automobile you tell me how one is supposed to deal with deal with them basically talk about three fans a bit on his theory in this to get something really wrong steve hart somebody over on them and ourselves in a recent offensive to somebody is a sense of we get that's a feeling and then come from that feeling the kenmore want to construct you actually took their endowments and a poem to petition and they get to make it

this cycle mendota conciliation i can see those psychological elements are underneath it along with the agency but so that's realistic get so it makes us better people when i was coming up and that was that that have ended defenses smart guns but that is to help us to do that we feel are predominantly and a petition somebody who automatically and mechanically goes to compose and then the narrative nor themselves maybe an opinion or to get to be too much lived about this mild thing on the air to bar association many he happened to me

the roses joe parent of somebody who committed a crime all happened amid this in a big way what happened to have a flash and thought essentials of lusting in the hat is that having is a way revenue fell below the price of his agency having a sexual part of a common cause and attract a member of the opposite sex in just shows that on one voting out that it's now been given immunity only healthy salad but that if the field to rescue two of those kinds of things he doesn't do to their endowment for ending that british engineers in the midst of feeling bad and nine and sat there was a vicious cycle a negative feelings let me let me be unfair with you for a moment and and really take a couple of heroes out of the book

and placed their condo up alongside what you just said is about guilt over injuring someone to hear you recite in the book kind of the day the movements of both martin and andy and martin luther king are anecdotes involves instances any use these serve these two personalities to two in york they use of old who sacrificed a great deal as reflecting the past two in the past and loving side of government and that they were caring human beings and you demonstrate how religion aided them and bringing about about change now there were song in society who were damaged by their actions you're our mom living in an indian us these demonstrations created chaos disruption yet

now i never had a feeling that either of them had any of about that and i'm not sure they should have but tell me should there should they have not a man can be looking and visitors and realistic kessler them another hand realistic reason to feel guilty that matter had some support them have wished that they could nobody changes without the embankments softening to anybody but you and the complex ago this iteration one can only hope they hit the least joe's only used comfort to people in insulated as a doctor and treating somebody and then angry in an attic a couple of very fun of their leg to say oh the end zone so to abolish medicare any of the law and the oppression of the system in that case the good in justified means that they thought were good thing and all of the vote means damaged

right along right now let me take you to the symbol of the worst so having related murders in gandhi and king to examples and mother teresa for example to the best let's go to the cops the jim jones send all that is fanaticism at passion for scaring taken to the destructive extreme and it sees you can see our fans of unhealthy of religiosity engine giant urgency about of selfishness agency hate ultimately sofia seligson and their regions the answer of that is you liane the camorra mafia not about the other people in anxiety as a creditor and even have health importance about his action didn't

show these developments of health the desert you didn't change you kept on getting more states and so we can see all of those ambassadors of lisbon using years question a judgment properly on government trying to learn more understand more of medicare to reflect any of those things think about the followers for a mobile first world follows of of gandhi and king on one side we're totally committed to have caught a big on the other side of the followers of a jim jones i mean where is the line drawn between the health on one sign the sickness on there and how was it that is dedicated to a lot of foreigners of both sides probably forward blindly and foreign bank is not this visit a healthy ones when

steadman and they converge in john's for reasons that become interested users add before they can so they will be blind followers and all kinds of situations that so what is healthy would be for people to have to make they're on good judgment in shawn's had some good characteristics he was that you know he did some good things early on in his solo he'd used and many more things so people were threatened by that but then it seemed like people were many of the followers get into keep that often mind than ten and a critical mind about that he was going to close too is the entity even though as a wannabe about may have found a different isn't it really is akin in psychology and the religion and some yet but i think in the end didn't stick in time before things were bad back problem are people who ordinarily they're kept their arms

they get healthy are we better then with believers were healthy are non believers are healthy and the leaders who were healthy religion then there should be a pause to ask that question there's more positive then agnosticism where it is new to read that some elements of agnosticism which is part of the oath is that it's in the dow jones xavier author of two faces of religion his program was produced in the studios of the bbc in television located in nashville tennessee poll