Monsignor LORENZO ALBACETE, Catholic Priest:

From the first moment I looked into that horror on September 11th, into that fireball, into that explosion of horror, I knew it. I knew it before anything was said about those who did it or why. I recognize an old companion. I recognize religion.

Look, I am a priest for over 30 years. Religion is my life. It’s my vocation. It’s my existence. I’ll give my life for it. I hope to have the courage. Therefore, I know it. And I know and recognize that day that the same force, energy, sense, instinct, whatever, passion – because religion can be a passion – the same passion that motivates religious people to do great things is the same one that that day brought all that destruction.

When they said that the people who did it did it in the name of God, I was not in the slightest bit surprised. It only confirmed what I knew. I recognize it. I recognize this thirst, this demand for the absolute, because if you don’t – if you don’t hang onto the unchanging, to the absolute, to that which cannot disappear, you might disappear. I recognize this thirst for the never-ending, the permanent, the oneness of all things, this intolerance or fear of diversity, that which is different. These are characteristics of religion.

And I knew that that force could take you to do great things, but I knew that there was no greater and no more destructive force on the surface of this earth than the religious passion.

Rabbi BRAD HIRSCHFIELD:

You can get so drunk on God that you don’t see anything else. And I didn’t. It’s so easy to get wrapped up in a messianic vision of how the world could be. And I know it’s easy because I did it.

I spent a part of my life, between the ages of 17 and 21, living off and on in the city of Hebron. Hebron is traditionally understood by rabbinic tradition as one of the four holiest cities in the land of Israel. It’s the burial place of the matriarchs and the patriarchs, of Abraham and Isaac and Jacob and Sarah and Rebecca and Leah. And the site where they are buried has traded between being a mosque and a church many times in the last 1,800 years.

And for Jews to be able to go back to that place where the founding fathers and mothers are buried is unbelievable. To be able, at the age of 18 or 19, to say, “This is where I belong” after thousands of years of exile is intoxicating. You believe anything is possible.

I really don’t remember, until it got so out of control that people I knew committed murder – I don’t think that I thought for a minute about the impact of my beliefs on other human beings who didn’t share them. Other people were just wrong.

It’s amazing how good religion is at mobilizing people to do awful, murderous things. There is this dark side to it, and anyone who loves religious experience, including me, better begin to own there is a serious shadow side to this thing.

It’s somewhat difficult, however, when violence conducted with God’s blessing against supposedly immoral unbelievers is part of Christianity and Islam’s historical tradition. If God did it, then it would seem to become a lot more acceptable for followers of that God to do it.

Would love to keep the conversation going…

Thought you might be interested in a very simple bottom-up model of Influenza that I’ve just written up for my blog. http://milesparker.blogspot.com/2009/05/agent-based-model-for-influenza-h1n1.html

David Brooks seems to really have jumped on the train. Epstein has actually done a really neeat model on exactly the issue of the interplay between the disease and fear contagions:

http://www.plosone.org/article/info:doi/10.1371/journal.pone.0003955