Ridley Scott is a great film-maker. He has directed some well-known blockbusters like the Gladiator movies. Of course not every film he directed was a hit, at least as far as the critics are concerned, but one that I really loved that was not critically acclaimed was “Kingdom of Heaven”.

The setting for that film is during one of the crusades, where the city of Jerusalem is being fought over between the Christians and the Muslims with both groups considering Jerusalem as their holy city. The Christian army had a peculiar rallying cry. As they were called into battle, their leader would cry out, “God wills it!” Followed by echos of, “God wills it! throughout the company.

God wills it. God wills death and destruction to our enemies? Well, if you look at the Old Testament I guess you could make a justification for holy wars. But if I’m reading it correctly, Jesus went completely the other direction. A quick reading of the Sermon on the Mount in Matthew 5 highlights different characteristics considered blessed – the humble, the meek, the merciful, the peacemakers.

The cry of ‘God wills it’ has been used throughout history to justify all kinds of atrocities against people. No one wants to be on the wrong side of God and when leadership is pushing a direction that they claim is ‘God’s will’, it’s difficult to swim against that pressure. It’s more than peer pressure, it’s universe pressure. God can’t be wrong, so if God wills it then it must be the right course.

Of course, in hindsight, the crusades were a really bad idea. As was the Spanish Inquisition. And all of it was done in the name of God. But let’s imagine for a moment the people on the receiving end of these horrible things done in the name of God.  It may not be as huge as a holy war, but a person, or an institution, or even a denomination claiming to represent God and getting it wrong can do great damage.

And a lot of damage has been done in the name of God. A lot. 

In the book, “Learning Love” my co-author, Christ Glatzel, and myself talked about lies that we believe about ourselves, where those lies were introduced in our lives, and taking God’s truth and using it to uproot the harmful lies.

But if the damaging messages you’ve received were introduced as if coming from God, that makes them so much more difficult to dislodge. To begin with these detrimental messages can be enshrined in church doctrine and long-held beliefs. To question them is to question the faith traditions you may have grown up with, that perhaps all your family and friends believe. These beliefs are a part of you. It’s not easy to separate those beliefs from your own identity.

Challenging anything that we’ve learned through religious experiences leads to something called “deconstruction”. Brian Zahnd, a pastor and author, describes this as “a crisis of Christian faith that leads to either a reevaluation of Christianity or sometimes a total abandonment of Christianity,” (in When Everything Catches Fire).

That’s tough. The things we believe about life are our foundation and if that foundation starts shifting it can upend us. But I believe we have to start looking at these “religious lies”. Harmful beliefs that have caused us damage. Even though the process can be immensely difficult and even painful. If we’re willing to go through it, we can come out the other side better for it.