Choosing My Religion

Question of the Day: Who gets to choose your religion?

Two very different news stories this week have raised the question about who decides what religion a person might be. One I read in the Tacoma News Tribune (01-29-08)--a story about a prison chaplain who is struggling with fallout from a new regulation that allows inmates to be a part of more than one religion. Under the new rules, to select a religious preference, all an inmate has to do is fill out a form. Further, they can change their religion once every six months.

The second story involves an Egyptian man named Muhammad Hegazy, a Muslim convert to Christianity who is requesting that the Egyptian government officially change his religious affiliation. According to the ruling of an Egyptian judge, "He can believe whatever he wants in his heart, but on paper he can't convert."

So, is one's religion really just a matter of filling out the right paperwork and having it approved? And the deeper questions: Who decides what religion an individual truly is? Can a person "self-convert," or must a person be received by the religious community of which he or she seeks to become a part?

As Americans, we are heavily biased toward the individual. We have been trained by our culture to believe that the individual is the center of authority and decision-making power: I decide what to buy; I decide what I want to be when I grow up; I decide who to vote for; I decide what church to attend; I decide what is true for me. But such a perspective is somewhat unique in history.

Even looking across the history of Jesus' followers and the Church, we see that there has always been a place for the community in conversion. In the book of Acts, an individual's conversion or coming to Christ would often be attested to by others who were already a part of the early Christian community (e.g., Saul by Ananias; Cornelius by Peter; Samarians by Peter & John). In addition, acts such as baptism and the laying on of hands accompanied the individual's conversion and reception into the faith community. These acts would be formalized over the years so that becoming a Christian included not only a public confession of faith in Christ, but also a period of training or catechism and the sacrament of baptism. The value of the community is sorely missing in much of American Protestantism.

And as much as we must wrestle with the role we play and the role the community of faith plays in our choosing our religion, we must also look ultimately to God. Jesus said, "No one can come to me unless the Father who sent me draws him" (Jn. 6:44). Paul the Apostle likewise understood that it is God who chooses us long before we might choose God, writing that God chose us in Christ before the creation of the world and decided in advance to adopt us as his children (Eph. 1:3-5).

So, how do you understand your conversion? If you are a Christian, how did you get there? What did you do? What did the Christian community do? What did God do?