Wednesday 20 August 2008

What does God have to do with an adventure industry conference?

A few weeks ago an email was forwarded to me about an adventure industry conference happening in the Drakensberg.

A paragraph in the conference invitation (general bulk invitation, not addressed to me personally) pushed my irritable button.
"I certainly look forward to see you at [venue]. May God in His Great and Awesomeness grant us the grace to again meet in such a way and that he will grant further favour on our new President the Venerable [John Doe] from [blah, blah, blah]."
I'm all for religious freedom and I'm quite happy for people to believe what they want; higher powers, fairies, Santa, Easter Bunny... But what has God have to do with an adventure industry conference? Surely people of different beliefs (and non-beliefs) will be attending? Is this a Christian, religious pow-wow or a conference about the adventure industry, one that is inclusive and accepting of all people?

People also sign their business emails with religious quotations and "God Bless". What does God, or Muhammad or the Flying Spaghetti Monster have to do with your work affairs (unless of course your business is a religious organisation).

What if the person to whom you're addressing your emails believes in a God different to yours? Or no God at all? Would you be offended if they signed their emails, "Wishing you a pleasant God-free day" or tagged "God doesn't exist" to their signature.

Part of religious freedom is about not blanketing others in your beliefs. Beliefs are personal and not everyone shares the same ones as you.

Stick to the topic and utter praise and songs of worship to your own God, in your own time and in your own place.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

And talking about work related email signatures, why do organisations append tags like "Please consider the environment, do you really need to print this email?" Nobody *wants* to destroy the environment, and what reason do accounting [fill it non-environmental business type as required] firms have for this condescending tone? Who print emails they do not need anyway? To me, their bandwagon jumping Go-Green PR is seriously misguided.

Anonymous said...

RAmen!