When religion becomes a political weapon, everyone loses

He writes that religion, combined with ambition and power, becomes a tool of division and social exhaustion Muhammad Elbaikam.

FAITH means a special moral bond between humans and God. However, when combined with ambition, fear and power, it becomes a language of separatism that morally wears societies down.

My grandmother would distribute candy to the ants so that life would continue.

It was a small gesture that might seem insignificant, but he gave it a deep meaning. He said that man’s relationship with God should remain clean and pure. He was not a religious scholar and did not speak in a theoretical language. And yet, in that simple sentence he conveyed a wisdom that I feel is painfully missing in our public life today.

Because the real crisis of our age is not religion itself, but what humanity does with it.

At its core, faith is an intimate relationship between the individual and the creator. No one has the right to measure someone else’s closeness to God. Moreover, no one can honestly claim to be the sole possessor of divine truth. Humans do not have absolute certainty; They have comments, experiences, wounds and hopes. We see life from our own perspectives, never from the whole picture.

This should lead us to humility. Instead, politics often turns religion into a performance of certainty.

In most of the world, religion is no longer left in the domain of conscience and morality. He is dragged into struggles for power, identity and control. It is used to harden boundaries between societies, sanctify political projects, and transform worldly interests into sacred obligations. This is where ordinary political conflicts begin to speak the language of heaven.

And when this happens, the disagreement is no longer considered a disagreement. This becomes blasphemy. Opposition turns into betrayal. Compromise is presented as moral surrender.

This is what makes politically framed religious conflicts so dangerous. Its true roots may be found in soil, influence, security, memory or domination. However, when these conflicts are wrapped in sacred language, they gain destructive emotional power. At this point, the opponent is no longer seen as a person with whom one can negotiate, but as an existential threat. In such an environment, peace itself begins to look like weakness.

Herein lies the great contradiction of our age. Humanity has advanced a lot in technology but has regressed in many moral aspects. We have built amazing machines, expanded communication, and accelerated information. But we haven’t kept pace with empathy, self-restraint, or moral clarity. We are more connected than ever before, but often less able to recognize each other’s humanity.

Sometimes it feels like the human mind is captured. Not necessarily by a truly supernatural force, but by the dark forces within human life: fear, humiliation, anger, greed, and the systems that profit from them. There are political cultures that thrive on persistent anger. There are media environments that reward emotion over facts. There are leaders who become stronger every time society is divided. In such an environment, the worst aspects of human nature do not calm down. They are organized and exploited.

As a child, I used to ask a question that bothered me: Why don’t the animals we feed run away? Why don’t they understand that one day they may be sold or bought? Why do they remain calm among the hands that feed them, unaware of what awaits them?

This was a child’s question, but it comes to my mind every time I watch people being dragged into conflict under great and noble names: religion, nation, honor, history, destiny. Flattered by rhetoric, they are mobilized and emotionally armed. They are said to be defending something sacred. However, many people do not realize how easily they can be used in the service of interests that do not actually belong to them.

And here a disturbing question imposes itself: Has science, thanks to its accumulated knowledge of human psychology and the means of influence made possible by technology, reached the point where it can accuse the human mind under many different names and turn it into a killing machine? This is no longer just a philosophical thought. The intertwining of propaganda, digital technologies, psychological engineering and ideological discourse to shape a collective consciousness that can lead people to hate while convincing them of virtue has become one of the defining concerns of our time.

In the end, everyone loses.

The dead lose their future. The living lose some of their humanity. Societies are losing the moral ground that once made living together possible. Even those who appear victorious lose because any victory built on the dehumanization of others is essentially a moral defeat.

Therefore, the answer is not to attack religion, but to protect it from political exploitation. Faith should not be excluded from social life, nor should it be turned into a badge of power. At its best, it should remain a discipline of conscience, a source of humility, a language of compassion, and a call to restrain the worst impulses within us.

My grandmother understood something that many powerful people do not: What is sacred can be corrupted. Even the purest relationships can be contaminated when touched by selfishness, ambition and the desire for domination.

And if religion is to have any meaning in this century, it must help man overcome the worst in himself, not bless him. From the moment faith turns into a political weapon, it ceases to glorify humanity and begins to participate in its destruction.