Introduction
Religion refers to a classified system of beliefs relating to an individual’s trust and faith in a mightier power as a way of life or decision-making characteristics of different people. More often, individuals base their choices in life on religious beliefs (Leiter, 2020). Nevertheless, if the religious ideals conflict with an individual’s way of life, reconnecting the two may be very difficult since religious beliefs may cause challenges that lead to uncharacterized experiences or actions. Conflicts with religious beliefs often lead to social problems that affect society wholly or partially. Social problems refer to behaviors or conditions giving adverse effects to a large group of people generally acknowledged as crucial for an intervention to address the particular issues (Gibbs, 2017). Social issues have two points of view: the objective point of view and the subjective perspective. From the objective point of view, social problems exist when there are negative consequences involving large groups of people.
On the other hand, the subjective component depicts social problems if there is a perception stating that behavior or condition should get addressed. The social issues associated with religion include immoral sexual behaviors, drug or substance abuse, discrimination, persecution, domestic violence, greed, and mental health issues caused by specific religious beliefs (Berger & Walsh, 2019). Religious persecution is the major problem that conflicts with people’s lives and religious ideas or opinions.
Religious Persecution
Religion for a long time has had the prospects of strengthening and enlightening the generations of the world owing to the religious ways of life depicting Christ. However, there emanate severe complaints about how religion contributes to people’s social problems in their lives over the years. The social-religious problem hindering peaceful relations between society and religious beliefs is religious persecution. Religious persecution refers to the systematic mistreatment of a group or individual in retaliation to their religious beliefs (Gibbs, 2017). The tendency to repress or alienate specific individuals and societies due to their diversity in religion often poses religious persecution and discrimination.
Additionally, religious persecution instead of discrimination takes different forms or even to the worst extremes (Al-Muqdad, 2018). For example, a foreigner of a different religion may get deported back to their original country for being of a different faith in the other country. Often Muslim countries oppress and discriminate against Christians in their countries because they view their way of life as the right way, which is different from another religion. Moreover, there can be persecution in the form of murder, extermination, enslavement, or other inhumane acts against individuals or society. Persecution can also be in the form of political or racial grounds that often leads to acts of crime to show dominance (Grim & Finke, 2018). Countries that offer extreme levels of persecution are such as Afghanistan, North Korea, Somalia, Pakistan, Libya, India, Iran, Sudan, Syria, and Yemen. These countries are dominated mainly by Muslims and find it appropriate to dominate over other religious beliefs such as Christians.
Moreover, people hold religious beliefs because they acquire the religious beliefs from an early childhood religious figure. How the premises get acquired determines the perception one would have concerning other religions generally. Since most individuals or groups hold religious beliefs because they view that they got caught in their childhood stages, they believe their religion is the only legal way of righteousness. Such thoughts often lead to religious persecution or discrimination against other religious beliefs. Superstitions make-believe that one religion is the only way of life and, therefore, oppression against any other religion is eminent. For example, a Muslim became a Muslim because they got raised as Muslims (Grim & Finke, 2018). In the same way, a Christian may have become a Christian because their family practiced Christianity all through their childhood; hence they believed in the Christian way of life.
Religious persecution began with the Christian oppression in 64 AD by the emperor Nero. A disastrous fire incident destroyed the city of Rome, and blame laid on the emperor. Even though Emperor Nero was to blame, he only cared about his rise to power. He took advantage of the panic and disorientation of the city to build a lavish private palace building on the place that got previously burnt by the devastating fire. The emperor ordered that Christians get rounded up and killed while others were torn apart by dogs, among other inhumane torchers. The incident marked the beginning of Christian persecution from all corners, with other religions dominating (Grim & Finke, 2018). The primary reasons that led to Christian oppression may have been that their religious beliefs depicted faults and pretense in other faiths that practiced several mysterious beliefs. Christian faith attacked most of the different religions’ thoughts because they believed in the holy trinity of God, the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.
Furthermore, pagans reveal other accusations on the Christian doctrine alleging that Christians practiced sacrificial practices such as taking the blood of Christ, which gets viewed as an act of cannibalism. Moreover, since the Christians refused to offer sacrifices for the roman gods, pagans became more suspicious of their adamancy against the roman rules (Al-Muqdad, 2018). Christians refused to offer sacrifices to the emperor, viewed as a semi-divine monarch who deserved sacrileges from other minor religious pilgrims. The emperor tested Christian’s faith by the threat of pain of death or sear by the emperor while offering incense to the images and sacrifices to his gods. Additionally, in the mid of second century, the martyr Polycarp’s faith got tested when he got ordered to say Caesaris was Lord and offer incense to save his life; he refused even after several subsequent tests that sabotaged his faith. His refusal to please the emperor and the gods of Rome, he was ready to meet his death where he got burnt alive (Grim & Finke, 2018). Following the subsequent burning in the city of Rome, several cases of Christian persecution continued, with several rampant deaths seen over the following centuries.
Rhetorical Theories
Rhetorical theory pays more attention to the forms, composition, means, venues, audiences, producers, effects, and criticism of discourse. It also refers to the body of thought concerning human symbol usage. Usually, the symbol usage of rhetoric depicts negative connotations and often gets contrasted with action, talks without substance, empty words, or mere ornaments (Raylor, 2018). Three forms of rhetoric give the basis of each rhetoric context: ethos, logos, and pathos. Ethos refers to the appeal that is character-based on the speaker. It, therefore, means that ethos-based documentation strictly takes root in the author. On the other hand, Logos refers to an appeal taking basis on reason or logic, while pathos rhetoric gets based on emotions.
Additionally, four rhetorical modes are; description, narration, argumentation, and exposition (Jones, 2020). Narration helps to narrate or tell a story of an event that had already taken place. It is a helpful tool in putting details or information into a logical order. It can be in the form of oral history or other forms of narratives. For example, persecution of Christians dates back to 64 AD, where Nero, a Roman emperor, stated Christian discrimination when he accused them of having torched the city of Rome. The description refers to the re-creation of events, visualization of scenes so that the reader can picture what exactly is getting described. It aims at making a vivid explanation of what is taking place. On the other hand, expository writing has the purpose of informing, explain, and describe an event or an idea. Moreover, argumentation refers to exchanging words between two people, each having varied opinions concerning an idea or issue (Grim & Finke, 2018). By adopting rhetorical theories, persecution as the religious problem can get analyzed in its entirety.
Furthermore, it’s ironic that religion as a doctrine can lead to such social problems as religious persecution. Religion has got widely known to provide social, spiritual, psychological, or rarely material support to individuals or groups. Therefore persecution of individuals based on religious differences is uncalled for in the true meaning of religion. Rhetorical theories can help analyze the impact of persecution on the doctrine of religion (Jones, 2020). Narratively, religion is doctrine that deals with the spread of the gospel of the Holy Scriptures and its teachings to the world population. The history of religion dates back hundreds of centuries, where there existed gods of all kinds, including Emperor Nero’s gods. Nero’s reign brought about the persecution of Christians in the early 64 AD (Grim & Finke, 2018). Description, as stated, gives a visualization of events as they took place and how they will end. Rhetorical representation allows for a vivid description of how persecution, vice in the religious doctrine began. It shows how people start to persecute, the reason behind their persecution, and who oppresses them. In reality, religion should not be an object of persecution or discrimination; instead, it should be an ultimate matter that helps people have a reasonable belief in life and their roles in the life they live.
Historical and Social-Economic Implications
Persecution as well defined to be an act of criticism based on the differences in religious beliefs, brings several implications for how people live. The social repercussions caused by persecution in religion can be, destroyed relationships, reduced communism, hatred between communities, and even communication (Berger & Walsh, 2019). For example, if a country comprises different religious beliefs with varied beliefs that certain types of thoughts are more valid than others, there would be persecution or discrimination of the minority religious groups. Having the dominant religion will bring pride and respite where other religious doctrines will get discriminated against socially or communally. Moreover, persecution and discrimination of different faiths can lead to severe economic implications such as loss of livelihoods or reduced economic trade relations.
Furthermore, religious persecution can lead to the disruption of entanglements and relations between churches and other religions. Muslims in other countries oppress Christians since the majority of the religious beliefs lie on Muslim doctrines. Arabian countries such as the United Arab Emirates are predominantly Muslim; therefore, any other religious beliefs in the country will get repressed (Gibbs, 2017). Such repression leads to religious persecution and discrimination. Economic implications due to persecution and intolerance of other religions can reduce economic interactions between the dominant beliefs and the repressed religion. Countries with the majority of Muslim doctrines can repatriate relationships with Christian communities hence reduced trade relations.
To develop solutions to the religious problem of persecution in religious doctrines, the issue of persecution should get looked into in terms of the root causes of persecution. The root cause of religious persecution often got depicted as competition between religious doctrines. Muslims, pagans, and Christians often engage in wars of conflict over which belief is very dominant; therefore, a country with more Muslims than Christians will repress the less dominant religion. Having balanced religious relations between different faiths can help solve the problem of religious persecution across the globe (Kayser & Budinich, 2019). Moreover, promoting interactions between the different religious beliefs will help reduce discrimination or persecution among religious doctrines.
Analysis of the Rhetorical Theories Used
Rhetorical theory pays more attention to the forms, composition, means, venues, audiences, producers, effects, and criticism of discourse. It also refers to the body of thought concerning human symbol usage. Usually, the symbol usage of rhetoric depicts negative connotations and often gets contrasted with action, talks without substance, empty words, or mere ornaments. Three forms of rhetoric give the basis of each rhetoric context: ethos, logos, and pathos. Ethos refers to the appeal that is character-based on the speaker. It, therefore, means that ethos-based documentation strictly takes root in the author (Jones, 2020). On the other hand, Logos refers to an appeal taking basis on reason or logic, while pathos rhetoric gets based on emotions. Rhetorical theories give a sense of criticism of discourse and therefore attempts to explain events vividly.
The theoretical narration of events gives an insight into how events took place and the expected results. Narrating the history of Christian persecution helps provide a glimpse into Christians’ origin of persecution and discrimination. Additionally, describing the theory of persecution gives a vivid description of the problem. Persecution in religious beliefs related helps portray the meaning and the reason for the act. Persecution destroys religion’s nature, which gets meant to help create more cordial relations among the different religious doctrines. Argumentation as part of rhetorical theory gets used to getting the varied views of persecution either positively or negatively (Kayser & Budinich, 2019). An individual might believe that persecution of Christians by other religions is a violation of the religious doctrine code of brotherhood. In an argumentative perspective, a different person might support the same in a different opinion. Therefore, persecution in religion is just a violation of what religion supposes to do.
Conclusion
In conclusion, religious, social problems refer to the social factors that hinder the smooth relationships and interactions amidst religious doctrines. Some of the religious, social problems include immorality, corruption, discrimination as well as persecution. Religious persecution refers to discrimination based on varied religious beliefs, which often leads to oppression. It creates disjointed relations among people swearing to protect the sacred words of the Holy Scriptures. Rhetorical theories can get utilized in the analysis of the most prominent social, religious problem. Solving persecution in religion requires establishing brotherliness between the different religions’ participants to create a universal Holy ground for all believers of The Holy Trinity.
References
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Berger, P. L., & Walsh, M. E. (2019). Social Problems and Social Action. Review of Religious Research, 1(2), 78. https://doi.org/10.2307/3510757
Gibbs, A. (2017). Analyzing and Solving Social Problems. Social Work for Sociologists. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137389688.0013
Grim, B. J., & Finke, R. (2018). Religious Persecution. Religious Persecution and Political Order in the United States, 1–24. https://doi.org/10.1017/cbo9780511762345.002
Jones, R. (2020). Rhetorical Theories and Activism. Activism and Rhetoric, 26–37. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781315144535-5
Kayser, O., & Budinich, V. (2019). Scaling Solutions to Social Problems in Religion. Journal of Social Problems. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137466549
Leiter, B. (2020). Religion. Why Tolerate Religion? https://doi.org/10.23943/princeton/9780691163543.003.0003
Raylor, T. (2018). Rhetoric and Leviathan. Philosophy, Rhetoric, and Thomas Hobbes, 254–274. https://doi.org/10.1093/oso/9780198829690.003.0008
