Uno

What factors of your native culture have informed your religious world view? Explain the impact of these factors

I am a Christian. I was born into a Christian family but I realized that I could define myself as a "Christian" in my recent years. Being in the midst of culture, tradition, religion, and various beliefs on this Earth, it is inevitable that these factors are interconnected and therefore have an impact on me as an individual.

Being Christian and furthermore having field missionary parents, I was taught what was right and wrong in a Christian viewpoint. My family and I moved to Tashkent, Uzbekistan when I was four and stayed there until 2005 (ten years). Living in such a remote part of the planet, having almost no contact with my native country South Korea, and only interacting with the community situated there, I have to say that my view of the world was rather limited. However, when we finally moved back to Korea, I was in for a shock.

Coming back to Korea caused me to embrace a culture shock I had thought I would never experience. Forced out of my shell of familiarity, the modernized culture of this country was distinctly different than what I had heard of. I was put into a public Korean school and learned my surroundings by simple observation. My first year back in Korea, all I saw were negative things. Cursing, beating, smoking, and drinking among students shocked my mind. Lavish people stood out to me because of the obvious fact that Korea was in debt to countries which had helped the restoration of the nation after the war. I had an overall negative view of my country, not to mention the whole world.

That first year, I tried everything to stay away from being influenced by the wrongs around me. However, after a tediously long time, as I familiarized myself to the people and beliefs around me, I realized that the world wasn't so corrupted after all. I learned to look deeper, peek under the surface of what was shown, and this gave me a whole new understanding of the reasons of why some bad things existed and that they could be improved. The realization of my mistake of being so quick to judge my surroundings struck me. After realizing how to interact with the atmosphere circulating me, I now know better how to look at the world.

My religious views have become less rigid and I have learned to be flexible with my Christian standards in ways in which I don't depend entirely on the "Ten Commandments" for judgment. Although it took me a long time to come to where I stand now, I find it thankful that I found my way eventually. Yet I still have more to learn and room to alter my religious perspective in ways that fit the society today. All I know is that the factors in my Korean surrounding will definitely play a part in further impacting my life.