So my last week has been absolutely tragic. Recently I had helped to look after an undersized cat for my nan who is a breeder. Bindi (the cat) was 10 weeks old and only about a quarter of the size she should have been. As such she was quite sickly when she came to us however she rapidly improved. In days she put on weight and started becoming lively as she should. Unfortunately on Thursday night her body shut down, she suffered a stroke and passed away. I have no pictures of her otherwise I would include one.
Now I am religious and did find this a cruel turn of fate. I suppose fortunately I know my gods to be sometimes cruel and they have never pretended otherwise. However the event did turn my mind to a discussion I had in a literature class last year. We were studying a book called 'The French Lieutenants Woman' by John Fowles. It is an absolutely marvellous book and I will highly recommend it however, it is a difficult read and can get quite confusing. It does attempt (and achieve) to mimic the style of the Victorian age writers and does feature alternate endings. Because this book provides a mirror between the Victorian and the modern age and because it heavily discusses religion,it was only natural for one of the discussion topics to have been the difference of religion between the ages.
Of course religion has much less of a hold on today's society than on the Victorians and there are several reasons for this. The first and foremost of course being the incredible advancement of science in the past few centuries. One of the reasons for religion was to explain the unexplainable however now that we have science the need for reassurance through an unseen God is slowly disappearing. Now the main reason for religion is the fact that it has become almost a part of human nature. Religion has always existed and it is something we are raised with and as such it has become a tradition that we uphold. Another reason is the fact that humans are perpetually afraid of what happens after death. It is the only thing that we have no material proof of and it terrifies us. As such we place our faith in something that tries to explain it for us.
Another reason (in my opinion) for the lack of religion in our society is the reduced social interaction. Going to church in the Victorian age was not just for religious purposes but also to catch up with friends and other frequent church goers. You invited people to church with you and they introduced others to you at church. Now in our technology filled age we have constant contact to others and we do not need to use the church as a method of 'catch up'.
Just as a note I would like to point out that this is merely my opinion and what I believed to be true during my class discussion. It is by no means true for individuals but rather a very generalised view of society as a whole. Religion is an incredibly individual topic and I do not intend to offend or act as though I know everything about people's personal choices. I would like to revisit this topic in a few weeks as I do find it interesting and of course I have not nearly began to scratch the surface of it. Once again I will recommend 'The French Lieutenants Woman' to those who are up for a challenge and if anyone is open to it I am happy to have an I depth discussion about the book however you will have to contact me.
Once again thank you for reading and I'll write again in a week.
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