Fathers and sons, between secularism and religiosity

We have been hearing frequent complaints lately about young people drifting away from religion. Of course this causes serious concern among parents who want their children to be religious, or among generations who themselves value religion; it cannot but do so.

People want the new generations to be like them, even better than themselves. It has been this way for as long as humanity has existed. Even among people who themselves have little to do with religion, the proportion of those who want their children to be raised religious and to follow religious rules is far from negligible. Because it is thought that religiosity provides children with protection and will keep them from bad habits.

This is not an unjustified thought at all; it is one constantly confirmed by experience, whose reliability can be demonstrated. A professor I know, extremely secular, even close to atheist, told me that he wanted to send his children to schools that also provide religious education, precisely out of these concerns, and I was frankly very surprised at first. But today we understand better how widespread and real a feeling it is for parents to see religion as a refuge for the safety and future of their own children.

Frankly, the schools tied to FETÖ, having seen very well this feeling that exists in many people, had found an excellent way to recruit especially the children of the secular segment as well. In the end, this tragic exploitation of the feeling did great harm to the feeling itself. This time, among parents who want their own children to be more religious than themselves, the idea took hold that such measures could carry a greater risk, and so the roads opened up further for the new generations toward a more secular, even thoroughly hedonistic way of life.

WOULD FATHERS WHO POLITICALLY DEFEND LGBT WANT THEIR CHILDREN TO BE LGBT?

It is possible to see a different reflection of this relationship between parents and children in attitudes toward LGBT in particular. Today a significant portion of the adult politicians who defend freedom and tolerance for LGBT people would never want their own children to be LGBT, do not desire it, and see such a possibility as a nightmare. One can look at the results of a series of sociological studies on this subject. Ask, if you like, all the politicians in particular who voice the political discourse on this issue. Would they want their own children to be homosexual? Would they want their own children to get involved in those circles and one day come before them with a different sexual preference? This is in fact a good test of sincerity for those who speak in LGBT politics. Let us set aside the insincerity of wanting to open all roads to a place where they would never want to see their own offspring. This negligence and inconsistency regarding generations inevitably spreads to the new generations as a sense of meaninglessness.

THE NEW GENERATIONS' ATTITUDES TOWARD RELIGION

That said, the reports about whether young people really are drifting away from religion or developing a different attitude toward religion are in fact not unanimously transmitted but quite varied. In fact there are no sociological studies done with good scales or sufficiently sound measurements on this. We can even come across studies showing exactly the opposite. In the Konda survey that I mentioned here the other day, there is even data showing that the new generations are actually more religious than their parents.

Still, there are enough cases to be the subject of complaints. There are enough examples to give the impression that young people have either drifted away from religion entirely or been drawn to currents like deism. In fact, if there are such examples, enough incidents are occurring to produce them. Among the most important causes, there can be no cause as natural as the untrustworthiness of people who look or claim to be religious.

BAD REPRESENTATIONS OF RELIGION ARE ALWAYS RELIGION'S GREATEST ENEMY.

People in general, when they see a bad representation, rarely go to the trouble of consulting the real thing. First impressions, first effects, can be enough to form an opinion in people.

In Iraq, the first major uprising of the Shiite youth, who had been raised in the Husayni seminaries with the expectation of dominating all of Iraq in the name of Shiism, took place two years ago against the Shiite mullahs. These young people, raised to serve the Guardianship of the Jurist (Velayet-i Faqih) unconditionally and self-sacrificingly, rebelled against Shiite clerics having Iraq's wealth plundered in the name of Shiism and in favor of Iran, and protested with the slogan "homeland first." This protest also meant that these young people wanted a government for Iraq far from the influence of religion. Undoubtedly it was not necessary for Shiism to have such a representation, so alien to its own country.

THE CLERGY'S MANNER OF DEBATE, LIKE A GRAB FOR MARKET SHARE, ALSO PUSHES PEOPLE AWAY FROM RELIGION

When we look at the state that the debates have reached today in Türkiye as well, especially among some theologians and some members of religious orders, it is impossible not to see that these debates have a side that pushes young people away rather than attracting them to religion.

Are those similar teachers, whose aggressive appetites try to lynch a teacher who has devoted his life to explaining the Qur'an, the Sunnah and authentic Islam and who has a very positive influence on young people, over an idea or a word spoken in a slip of the tongue, even in a position to carry out an impact analysis of these appetites themselves? Why do they not give priority to conveying the message of Islam that they too truly believe in, in the most correct way?

What love, what excitement is it, that someone who speaks in this field and has been quite effective in pulling many young people out of the swamp of deism, atheism or secularism, is hunted down with zeal, while that same zeal is not shown against the real enemies of Islam?

Do you think that you can put your own answers in place of the doubts, meaninglessness and questions you will create in the minds of thousands, tens of thousands of young people who are being positively influenced by the person you eliminate over a word, over a thought?

A serious sense of meaninglessness is experienced by young people, and in fact by people of every age, precisely because of this kind of zealotry? This too needs to be seen.

So what is this fight, is it a fight to grab a market? What kind of market? A market whose merchandise bought and sold is religion?