“There are lots of religions and I’m not sure only ONE has to be the right way.”

People who in the name of tolerance reduce all religions to a handful of shared moral principles fail to notice their own staggering intolerance. They think they are being nice, but they are not. In fact, such broad brushing is offensive to the devoted people of across the belief spectrum of religions and spiritualities.

Ravi Zacharias has traveled to almost 70 nations and has made the study of religions a life pursuit. He points out that Buddhism is supposed to be the most irenic and accommodating of all viewpoints, and yet Gautama Buddha, born a Hindu, rejected two fundamental doctrines of Hinduism, the caste system and the full authority of sacred Hindu texts. As Zacharias concluded in our phone conversation for this project, “The most unfortunate assumption that is made is that all religions are fundamentally the same and only superficially different. It’s exactly the opposite. Religions are fundamentally different and at best superficially similar.”

Christianity is not alone in saying its beliefs supplant all others. Every faith and every belief system makes exclusivistic claims. In fact, anyone who asserts anything proves they implicitly accept some things as true and reject others as false. It does not matter whether the subject of conversation is Christ or college basketball or climate change.

From our standpoint as Christians, a world full of religious options boils down to two things: good works or God’s grace. It is one or the other. Other religions require good works—living a moral life, obeying the law, reincarnating to pay off your karmic debt, etc. Christianity holds to God’s grace—getting to heaven not because of what we do but because of what Jesus has done. We do not ascend up to God through our piety or good works. God came down as a man to reconcile mankind to God. Like the apostle Paul wrote, “For there is only one God and one Mediator who can reconcile God and humanity—the man Christ Jesus. He gave his life to purchase freedom for everyone. This is the message God gave to the world at just the right time” (1 Timothy 2:5-6). What we believe is different. Because of our belief that Jesus is the only way, and that He loves and welcomes all people to trust in Him, we do not believe it is in any way mean to invite people to change their mind about Christ and Christianity. This is the subject of the next blog.