Human beings have their perspective shaped by the peculiarities of their physiological and mental perception, interests, and dreams, and an internal drive to fulfill them. These things are called personality, inner will, and motivation, and they are present in all types of human activities and inevitably influence and manifest themselves there. When these elements of human nature collide in any environment, two or more persons either cooperate or begin to oppose and conflict with each other. “An existential battle between truth and error, right and wrong, God and Satan, Salvation and Damnation” begins at that point (Ruane, 2021, p. 111). It often leads to societal phenomena of religious intolerance in such systematic human activity as religion.
Western civilization has witnessed one of the largest and bloodiest events of religious intolerance within a single congregation. It was “the centuries-old conflict between Protestants and Catholics in Europe” in the late Renaissance (Ruane, 2021, p. 109). Religious intolerance was manifested both relatively mildly in such ways as mutual accusations of heresy and apostasy from Christian doctrines and misinterpretation of sacred texts and severely in the form of religious genocide.
One can say that internal intolerance in Christianity is a controversial phenomenon. It is because the fundamental tenets of this Abrahamic faith are equality, compassion, and forgiveness. These stem from a tolerance that many experts and philosophers, such as Voltaire, considered the core and source of righteous and true Christian worship and behavior (Voltaire, 1763). The European wars of religion and internal Christian religious intolerance were historical and theological paradoxes that affected all congregations in Europe and the Americas.
References
Ruane, J. (2021). Long conflict and how it ends: Protestants and Catholics in Europe and Ireland. Irish Political Studies, 36(1), 109-131.
Voltaire. (1763). A treatise on tolerance. Hanover College.