According to Encarta (2008) religion is defined as a consecrated commitment which is taken to be a religious truth. One should deem the implication of confidence in personality continuation with no creation declare relating to what it really is or should be. Religion is also considered one of the many freedoms that a person has in America. Choosing the correct religion can be one of the most important choices a person makes because essentially a religion creates within every individual a sense of purpose as well as a value system. Because America is such a melting pot of cultures and religions many believe it is preposterous for any one individual or group to claim that their respective religion is the right religion.
While the religion of an individual selects may be the one that fits their idealistic sense of what a religion should accomplish, another person may believe that the very same religion is not that which creates a holy environment or fulfills their particular value system. Religion often provides the guiding rule for human actions and principles of conduct with social values firmly rooted in religion even for secular beliefs, with the recognized moral code for the Christian faith being the Ten Commandments (Taylor et al, 2000).
Bochner (1973) defines cultural identity by its gathering cluster, which is frequently rather noticeable from the alternative groups among whom they contribute to the corporal setting in which the country they reside in. Though stress is the perception it’s similar to the deliberation of a state and public personality illustrates a set of personalities which associate a specified population divided among one another and ahead of their personality dissimilarities. The theories of cultural identity consist of typologies of edifying performance, such behaviors are suitable and unsuitable ways of gathering essential requirements and explaining life’s important predicaments. The concept of cultural identity also integrates the common grounds, principles, descriptions, viewpoints, mainly insensible, outlines of actions.
In psychoanalytic the writing, by Erik Erikson (1959), uniqueness is a fundamental structure of supernatural societies which extend in consecutive psychosexual segments during an individual’s lifetime. Erikson focused the larger segment of his systematic learning on individuality difference, recognizing the cultural background. The systematic viewpoint, as spoken by Erikson, is simply one of a assortment of meaning.
Religion and Cultural Identity
Religion consists of methodical outline of ideas, morals, and performance, obtained by individuals as an associate of culture. These outlines are organized since their appearances are normal in incidence and appearance. Within all faith, there are dissimilarities of understanding of values and denotation. Religion is a carcass of viewpoints lengthens from an outset of an enormous, to some direction of factual and incorrect here on earth. Society is extremely diverse in importance, depending on situation. While a culture consists of numerous people, nothing is slightly homogenous. People within a cultural tend to do things in a different way, however all ethnicity contain positive prototype that make a distinction from other ethnicity, even as they too contain confident stress forced on individuals, approaching them towards certain ethnicity, which are distinctive of that customs, yet not originate in other customs.
Religion is somewhat customized by habitual practices at its limitations, in its process of reverence, and the nature of punishment it compels for misbehavior. Religion also reinterprets scholars and most important practitioners, whose dissimilarity of belief guides consistently to rupture and different prevailing attitude.
Culture on the other hand can be measured as the complete common legacy of man; which is the custom of a scrupulous individual grouping, a means of living educated from, and shared by, the associates of that grouping. Considering the idea of culture is the answer to accepting individual performance (Murdock, 1955).
Culture identity is the biased standard of all the behavior or partiality of the citizens of a certain society. When one is talking about ethnicity, it’s an expressive implement, and individuals must indicate point in time, since individuals recognize how unpredictable it can be (Murdock, 1955). Society is a phrase of our individual personality, restricted by the limitations of the situation: by the food we eat, the ways we entertain, the family values, and the accommodation fashion.
The role of the individual, depending on their ‘race’ and gender and within their cultural and ethnic setting helps to establish their personal and social identity and so each have inherent common characteristics. Doctrines or common beliefs are shared by followers therefore uniting them, but this idea is not exclusive to religion; non religious sectors share common beliefs particularly in light of loss of faith in institutions and belief systems by members of society.
Conclusion
In today’s multicultural society, groups and individuals identify themselves and live within the context of their ethnicity, ‘race’, class, culture and gender. Any individual can identify themselves on a myriad of levels: in a personal sense, a social sense, on an ethnic, cultural, spiritual or religious basis and by way of their moral values. Religion is such a complex issue and it seems each person has a different take on the reasons behind their belief in a certain religion. Therefore while religion is vital to the livelihood of American society, it is incorrect to say it brings Americans together. This essentially means that every individual has the opportunity to express themselves freely with regards to their religious preference. Culture as we know it today provides a significance and structure to an individual’s constrain and enthusiasm that widens towards a considerate of the planetary array of the world. In all cultures, one raises the enormous idealistic issues of life, the source and providence of continuation, the natural world of awareness, the importance of actuality, and the importance of the an individual’s understanding.
References
Bochner, S. (1973).”The Mediating Man and Cultural Diversity.” Topics in Culture
Learning Series, Vol. 1, 1973, 23-37.
Encarta (2008). Religion. Retrieved July 27, 2008 from
http://encarta.msn.com/encyclopedia_761565187/Religion.html
Erikson, E. (1959). “The Problem of Ego Identity.” Psychological Issues, 1, no. 1,
:101-164.
Murdock, G. (1955). “Universals of Culture.” In Readings in Anthropology edited by J.
Jennings and E.A. Hoebel, New York: McGraw-Hill 13-14.
Taylor et al (2002) Sociology in Focus. Lancashire : The Causeway Press