Religion

I've noticed (actually I've noticed this for a while now) that everyone seems to pre-maturely judge people when it comes to certain things such as religion. Why do people judge others based on this? You know what I dream of? I dream of a world where we can all worship and serve the same God; a world in which there are not thousands of different churches and denominations but one church and one denomination. I fully believe that God exists, but I do not understand why certain Baptist preachers feel it necessary to get up in front of their congregation and belittle others for their beliefs. Who are we to judge others' beliefs? We're no one; we're merely peasants in a religious world filled with dictators and monarchs.

I've listened to those same preachers say that religion is the quickest way to send someone to hell (I'm not even slightly exaggerating when I say this). If that were the case, wouldn't they be going to hell? I mean let's face it: technically speaking, many religions--certainly most of the mainstream and most popular religion such as Islam, Catholicism, Judaeism and all the branches of Protestantism--believe essentially the same thing. Is it entirely possible that we're all going about religion and the way we serve God the wrong way? On the other hand, perhaps no one religion is more correct that the other. For that matter, who's to say which religion is more correct than another religion? True, someone could say "God spoke to me and told me the way I'm teaching is correct", but honestly, couldn't even the devil himself make something like that up?

I consider myself a Christian, but I wish everyone could simply join together and live in peace and harmony. If not worship the same deity, I desperately wish we lived in a world where no one judged anyone else for having beliefs that differ from theirs. For example: imagine someone that you're close to doesn't like ketchup, yet you do; are we to say either person is more correct or more wrong for preferring one condiment over another, or for not having a condiment preference whatever? The analongy there is: religion is simply all based on opinion. Once we get past the fact that we all basically the same God (I like French fries, but I prefer mine without ketchup as oppoosed to you) but just different ways about going about worshipping him (the kethcup in the aforementioned scenario) I believe we can get pst the petty differences that divide people on a religious level.