Religion and the Western Mind

As Vine Deloria Jr explains in God is Red the western mind assumes that the change in personality in humans must take place for religion to effective.  Most of this includes major changes in ones life.  This, in my opinion, is not a way to change someone for the better as it just changes the person completely, his or her ideals and all.  These ideals have been adopted from European decent and eventually transferred into the minds of Americans.  To summarize, the Christian religion involves a major change in your own intentions and ideals.  In contrast to this, the Native American religion does not aim to change personality but behavior.  I believe this is a much more effective method of becoming a better person.  By changing personality you are essentially stripping yourself of who you are but by changing behaviors and actions, you can better yourself by being kind to others.  This is what all religions should be striving for.  Another major difference between these religions is how they view their Deity.  "When we turn from Christian religious beliefs to Indian tribal beliefs in this area, the contrast is remarkable.  Religion is not conceived as a personal relationship between the deity and each individual.  It is rather a covenant between a particular god and a particular community" (194).  This quote summarizes nicely how these two religions differ.  The Native belief is that your relationship with your god is not based on an individual level but a community level for all to share.  I believe that this is a great basis for religion as it allows people to rid themselves of greed and selflessness.  By adopting this method we can all strive to become better people as a community instead of on an individual basis