I was watching Heartland w/ John Kasich the other night and an interesting topic was being discussed. The segment was entitled, “Can a smart person believe in God?”. Author Michael Giullen was the guest expert of the segment, having just penned a book of the same name. The discussion made me ponder the question. Is an intelligent person able to believe in a supreme entity that displays no physical proof of existing in the first place?

I first thought about the question subjectively. I consider myself somewhat intelligent, although some of you might disagree. I also consider myself a spiritual person, albeit not conforming to one specific organized religion. If I must be labeled, I would consider myself Tibetan-Buddhist, only because it falls in line with MY belief system. As to address the question stated above, I feel one would be a fool to not concede that there is some additional force at work in this universe other than that of humans. Be it nature, be it Allah, be it Karma, be it God, be it science. To suggest that a greater force does not exist displays ignorance, narcism and stupidity.

I think that religious people are deemed “not smart” or ignorant because the overwhelming majority condemn beliefs that are not in line with their own. This, in turn, makes them seem less intelligent because they are unwilling to understand a different point of view. I’ve been told many times that I will burn in hell because I do not accept Jesus Christ as my lord and savior. In my opinion, we mislabel religious people as ignorant. They are not ignorant because they believe, but because they are intolerant.

I understand that certain religions are less accepting of others. It shouldn’t be that way. If you look at a cross section of the major religions on this planet, they all teach tolerance, forgiveness and love. All religions are beautiful in their own right. It’s when intolerant fundamentalists hijack a belief system that religion gets a bad name. So to answer the question, I believe that a smart person can believe in a God-like entity, but it is a truly wise person that also realizes there are, often times, more than one answer to a question.