Every religion has extremes and everything in between. Sociologically there is a place for each point in the continuum-- an ecology of viewpoints in delicate and discomfiting balance, and the mixed blessing of diversity.

If you pull back a little and look at the big picture, even the most conservative have a role to play in keeping certain traditions alive for the succeeding generations. Heck, we even have folkie fundies-- don't we call 'em purists? Keep some traditions, throw out others. In music we call it the folk process. Societies have a process of weeding out and planting new traditions, too. One hopes to contribute to decreasing ugliness and increasing loveliness.

Because even tho there is a place for each point in the continuum, as a species we tend toward improvement... so the exact location of each extreme tends to move, over time, toward the positive, all things considered. Change is all part of the scheme of things, and upward trends are our collective responsibility.

But the whole picture of the human race has room for even the extremes-- or we wouldn't have 'em.

~Susan