Religion And Its Effect On Identity

Religion And Its Effect On Identity

It may seem simple, but at some point in our lives we stop to think, what is our purpose in this world, why are we here and what will happen once we are am gone? It is this search for answers why most of us turn to religion. Religion has the ability to deeply affect our identity: it offers answers to all or most of the questions we have. Religion also has the power to give us a sense of being; a sense that we are here for a higher purpose and if we adhere to certain rules and work towards that gold we will somehow be greatly rewarded by a more divine power.
There are many factors that may affect a person’s identity, religion though is one of the most important, whether consciously or unconsciously we all identify with religion every day, it exists in every aspect of our lives. Religion helps to shape our identity as individuals, and these identities differentiates us from everyone else, it is key in the way in which people care about each other and care for what is going on around us. They are important bases from which we create new activities, new worlds and new ways of being. Identity is an often used word that is rarely been defined, but according to the Merriam Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary, it gives the definition that identity is: a sameness of essential or generic character in different instances. This means that no matter what the situations may relates to, a person who knows what their identity is will always have the same outlook. A perfect example would be in the case study done by Oliver Sacks in An Anthropologist on Mars: The Case of the Colorblind Painter, Mr. I who is a painter, identifies with everything through painting so even when he lost his ability to see colors it affected every aspect of his life, even music. As Sacks stated
Music, curiously, was impaired for him too. Because he had an extremely intense synesthesia, so that different tones had immediately been translated into color, and he experienced all music simultaneously as a...