Other Religions
August 31st, 2025 “Other Religions” Rev. Heather Jepsen
Summer Sermon Series: Stump the Pastor
Isaiah 55:1-5 and John 10:11-18
This Sunday we conclude our summer sermon series, “Stump the Pastor”. I never did preach about my own “stump”, but we had lots of interesting topics that we addressed together here in worship. From questions about heaven and what makes a good person to thoughts about science and war, from mining the Bible for fashion advice to wondering what makes a good leader, from looking at the origins of our Bible to the origins of our denomination, this has been such a fruitful and interesting time together. Today we tackle our last topic, other religions.
The author of this week’s question asks, “How do other religions view Christianity?” This is such an interesting question to ask, since it’s not what we might expect. Rather than asking what we think about them, this person asks what they think about us. A moment for full disclosure: If I had a year to write this sermon, I would go about quizzing folks of other faiths to get a personal idea of how they view Christianity in general and us as a particular congregation. But I only had a week, so all my research today is curtesy of google and my own religious education.
I think the best place to start today is with the Abrahamic faiths. Judaism, Christianity, and Islam all trace their roots back to Abraham from the book of Genesis. We will begin with Judaism since it’s the oldest of the three. As we talked about in our sermon on the Bible, the Jewish faith shares our Old Testament or the Hebrew Bible with us. They trace their lineage through Abraham’s covenant with God to make a holy community and they, Israel, are that holy community of covenant.
The differences between Jews and Christians all center around the figure of Jesus. We know that Jesus was a Jew and probably never intended to start a new religion. Christians share many beliefs with Judaism, expect our belief that Jesus is the promised Messiah. This issue of Jesus’ holiness is the main departure place between the two faiths. Jewish people believe strongly in monotheism, which is the idea of one God and only one God. And many Jews believe that our doctrine of the Trinity, with Father, Son, and Holy Spirit is actually polytheism or a worship of multiple gods.
Because they don’t accept Jesus as the Messiah, Jews don’t accept the New Testament as holy scripture, which makes sense. Many Jews are still waiting for a Messiah to come. Their messiah was supposed to rebuild the temple and usher in an era of world peace, and Jesus didn’t do that, so he doesn’t meet the requirements.
Other touchy places between Jews and Christians are our long history of antisemitism and blaming the Jews for killing Jesus. And our history of trying to force Jews to convert to Christianity. Also upsetting are the ways we co-opt their rituals for our own tradition like blowing the shofar or celebrating Passover.
Our other sibling in the faiths of Abraham is Islam. Muslims trace their lineage to Ishmael, Abraham’s first son. While Jews and Christians tell a story of that son being cast aside in favor of Isaac, Muslims tell a story of that son being chosen and accepted by Abraham. In fact, the Kaaba in Mecca, that big black box that Muslims process around during Hajj, that is said to have been built by Abraham and Ishamel as the first house of worship on earth.
In general, Muslims respect us as “people of the Book” through our shared lineage with Abraham. Muslims view Jesus as a prophet who was a unique messenger from God. As siblings in a faith tradition, Muslims believe that if Christians believe in God and do good deeds then we too will be saved in the last days.
Like Jews, Muslims disagree with us regarding Jesus’ divinity. They too see our doctrine of the trinity as step too far in the path of polytheism. Also, we have a troubled history together and like the Jews, there are a lot of hard feelings between us about violence in our shared past.
What about the Eastern religions? What do they think of us and our practices?
The Hindu tradition is not really one religion but instead is a blending of religious traditions found throughout the geographical area of India and beyond. In general, Hindus believe that Dharma or right way of living helps us to overcome the continuing cycle of life, death, and rebirth.
Many Hindus respect Jesus, and admire him as a wise teacher and a divine figure. Hindus believe that the divine is present in all religions, and so they accept our idea of Jesus as divine and they don’t have any problems with our doctrine of the Trinity.
What Hindus do have a problem with is our exclusivity. Since they believe that there are many pathways to divine wisdom, they find our belief that Jesus is the only way to salvation to be offensive.
And again here, our violent past is a point of contention. Many Hindus have suffered and been offended by Christian missionary work and find the attempt to convert Hindus away from their ancestral faith to be offensive. Also, there has been violence in the past between the two faiths.
Buddhism is also traced back to India and is its own path of dharma or right living. Buddhists focus on a path of liberation from suffering to achieve enlightenment. Buddhism can be practiced as a religion, where there is no god, or as a philosophy that can be combined with other beliefs about the world.
Many Buddhists respect Jesus and the teachings of Christianity because we have a shared understanding of compassion and the importance of helping others. Buddhists emphasis a personal experience as a path to enlightenment whereas Christians emphasize a relationship with God and community.
Finally, I want to look at Taoism which is a philosophical and religious tradition from China. Taoists believe in the Tao or the way. This is an underlying cosmic power that creates the universe, saves the good, and punishes the wicked. Kind of like the force in Star Wars, the Tao is not a god but an energy in our world that we can connect to or ignore.
Taoists aren’t opposed to Christianity, but they don’t see it as a complete view of the world. Taoists disagree with our idea of sin as they view deviations from the path as errors but not evil. For Taoists the goal is to follow the flow of the way, rather than the Christian path of uniting to God and following God’s will in the world.
In general Taoists and Christians can co-exist since Taoism suggests that all religions are paths to the Tao or way. Also, their goal of universal harmony argues for peace between the two groups. Because the Tao is beyond words and human understanding, like other traditions, Taoists do not like our history of trying to convert people to our faith tradition using arguments or force.
What about us? What do we think of other faiths? While some argue that Jesus is the only true path to God, others feel that we can live side by side with other traditions in our pursuit of God and a better life on this planet.
In the Old Testament, the prophet Isaiah imagines a time when all nations will be joined together under God’s great tent. “Ho, everyone who thirsts, come to the waters . . . You shall call nations that you do not know and nations that you do not know shall run to you.” This could be interpreted to mean that God’s blanket of welcome will be extended beyond the bounds of traditional religion and the exclusive nation of Israel. And while in the gospel of John Jesus tells us that he is “the way, the truth, and the life” he also says, “I have other sheep that do not belong to this fold.” Even Jesus acknowledges that when he gathers the sheep, there will be ones we do not recognize.
I believe that in worshipping a God of mystery we are tasked with keeping our own minds open to other pathways to the divine. While we may not worship other gods or adhere to other religious practices, there are beneficial things we can learn from other faiths.
Judaism has a higher value of creation than typical Christianity, and it would do us good to embrace that. Islam has a strong support for a universal community, and the 5 pillars of Islam are heavily focused on charity and caring for the people around us. From Hinduism we could embrace an understanding of the vastness of God, and from Buddhism we could practice compassion and loving kindness. From Taoism we can embrace following the path of God as we understand it and not obstructing other people’s pursuit of the way.
As you know, there are many religions in this world and many that are much older than our tradition. As those who choose to follow Christ, I think it is important for us to understand other traditions so that we can make an educated choice about our faith journey. Christianity has many good ideas that we can share with other religions, just as we can learn from other tradition’s practices and beliefs.
If we believe in the absolute mystery of God as well as God’s all-powerful presence in our world, then it is not out of the question to believe that God can speak to different people and different cultures in ways that are unknown to us. There is plenty of room to thank God for our own path of faith while respecting the paths that others choose.
This concludes our summer sermon series of tough questions and answers. Moving forward into the next cycle, I thought we would pursue the Narrative lectionary which is a way of reading through the whole arc of the Bible together in a year. I look forward to exploring our own faith and our Biblical tradition together in the Sundays to come. Thanks for all your good questions this summer. It has been a fruitful season. Amen.
