Autobiography - The Galindo Group

Ram Galindo THE MAKING OF AN AMERICAN Page 158
Driven by another supreme instinct to feel close to God, and in lieu of a rational
understanding of how we relate to our creator, mankind has, for millennia, reached out
to Him (or Her) by faith alone. Even the most learned theologians who seek to make
religion compatible with reason have to start with a leap of faith by admitting that their
particular God exists as they propose without proof of its existence. Undoubtedly
though, what different populations chose to believe about God and how they chose to
relate to their Creator, was a determining factor of their civilizations and cultures. Thus,
the roots of morality were planted on the seeding grounds of the relationships adopted
by men toward the deities they worshiped. From the earliest of times these religious
relationships were transmitted through the family.
In America, the ruling imported religion was Christianity with its many branches, but the
Founding Fathers, despite the pressures they were subjected to, or perhaps because of
them, held to the wisdom of not adopting any branch, or even a direct cult of Christ
himself, as the official state religion. This was another of the great acts of wisdom with
which they endowed their country. Countries that do not have an official religion do not
start religious wars. In a minuscule scale, even problems such as the one I experienced
when I was president of the Cochabamba American School, which I relate in Freedom
Fighters (Chapter 2), do not occur in America.
The absence of an official religion removed a large hurdle to enter the playing field for
any human who, sharing the values of America, could make a contribution to the
country’s improvement. Immigrants came here escaping religious persecution, evading
religious wars, looking for a safe place to worship in their brand of religion, and seeking
to start their own religions. America was at the vanguard among nations legislating
separation of church and state. This fact was an essential ingredient of America’s
genius. In my opinion, people who challenge it in the press or in the courts are very
shortsighted and confused, for instead of strengthening America, in the long run they
would weaken it. I see the breaching of the barrier between church and state as one
sign of the onset of decay.
The absence of an official religion left all Americans with the desirable choice of
adopting the most suitable one for their needs. Thus, competition in the market place of
religion came about. This openness to meet the spiritual needs of the people created
the proliferation of a wide spectrum of splinter so-called fundamentalist Christian
religions, gave the opportunity to form innovative ones such as, for example, the Jesus
Christ Church of the Latter day Saints and the Church of Scientologists; and offered
grounds to replant old ones such as Muslim, Buddhism, Hinduism, Shinto, Bahai and
others. Religion has a profound influence on America. Most people attend one church or
another. We do this more than in most other western countries where one church
enjoys the favor of the state and as a result people get bored with it. In the Middle East
many people living in theocracies become fanatic. My observation is that America’s
even and wide-open playing field leaves religion largely as an unregulated, totally free
enterprise able to help set the standards of morality unhindered by the state. While
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