Can There Be One True Religion?

3/5/2025

“Christians are bigoted, closed-minded, and intolerant people”

“How can Christians claim that they alone worship the one true God? Doesn’t that make everybody else wrong?”

“Saying that other people are wrong is such a narrow-minded, xenophobic thing to say and so unloving”

“All religions are equally valid and all basically teach the same thing”

I’ve been a Christian now for 16 years (since my freshmen year in high school). For 16 years I’ve heard similar objections to the exclusive claims of Christianity and even more prevalently in recent years. The pluralistic, relativistic, all truth is equally valid, all lifestyles are equally good, and all moralities should be decided by the individual and not by institutions American culture that we live in today does not like the idea of Christians claiming to have the one true religion or the sole key to heaven.

I want to answer three key questions that are pivotal to resolving this issue:

1. What is a religion?

2. Can there be one right/true religion?

3. Does Christianity claim exclusivity?

1. What is a religion?

Most people, when they of religion, think of the major religions in the world: Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, or Buddhism. Tim Keller argues in his book, The Reason for God, that religion is “is a set of beliefs that explain what life is all about, who we are, and the most important things that human beings should spend their time doing. For example, some think that this material world is all there is, that we are here by accident and when we die we just rot, and therefore the important thing is to choose to do what makes you happy and not let others impose their beliefs on you. Notice that though this is not an explicit, “organized” religion, it contains a master narrative, an account about the meaning of life along with a recommendation for how to live based on that account of things.”

By that definition of religion, (a set of beliefs that explain what life is all about, who we are, and the most important things that human being should spend their time doing) we all have a religion we believe in. Even if your religion does not compromise of regular gatherings on a weekly basis, a holy scripture, or even prayer, everybody believes in something about what life is all about, who we are, and how we should spend our time.

When you certainly look at the world around us, you can’t help but to notice that people are worshiping something/somebody and living according to their set beliefs and values. Whether it’s a sports team, money, career, family, good food, travel, retirement, material possessions, or a golden statue, we are all worshiping something. We are all spending our time, money, effort (making sacrifices), we are all hoping for a version of heaven/hell that our different “gods” offers us, and we fundamentally believe that there is a moral code that we should live by in order to please our different “gods”

If money is your religion/“god” for example, you may sacrifice your health, family, and best years to earn as much money as possible (sacrifice). Your version of heaven is having as much money as possible and your version of hell is being broke. And the “moral code” you live by is that you should do whatever it takes to earn as much money as possible and anyone who thinks otherwise or stands in your way is violating your “code.”

The question is not - are you religious? The question is really - what’s your religion? What do you believe in? What is life all about for you? Who are we?

Your religion can be anything quite frankly.

It’s that thing you can’t live without. It’s that thing that defines you. It’s the thing that makes like have meaning purpose and significance. It’s the thing that brings you ultimate joy and happiness and fulfillment. That’s your “god”, that’s your religion and we all have one.

Coexist bumper sticker promoting pluralism and relativism

2. Can there be one right/true religion?

We live in a day and age of pluralism and relativism in this postmodern culture/society today. The prevailing thought is that everybody can create their own truth, truth is relative, everybody is right, nobody is wrong, “what’s right for you is right for you and what’s wrong for you is wrong for you.”
In western cultures today, it is widely considered good and very much virtue signaled that we are to accept all views, all religions, all moralities, all lifestyles, all choices that everybody makes as equally valid. The values we enjoy are tolerance, acceptance of all opinions, and inclusivity of all religions/worldviews. If you say that other people are wrong, or if you claim exclusivity, or if you disagree with others about their morality, their religion, their life choices, or their views, you are labeled as bigoted, closed minded, fanatics, xenophobic, religiously puritanical/fundamental. 

Today, it is said, the only moral absolute should be freedom and the only sin is intolerance or bigotry.

Here’s the problem: although our culture claims to be relativists, pluralistic, and tolerant in theory, in practice, relativism and pluralism are actually impractical, illogical, and unfeasible.

If a professor or teacher stood up before their class and argued, “The earth is flat and that we should believe that the earth is flat and be terrified of potentially falling off the earth because the earth is flat!”, I would hope that somebody would stand up in that classroom and shout back, “teacher, you’re wrong and here’s why!…”

If a friend came up to you and said, “the holocaust never happened, Hitler was a nice man and never put anybody in any concentration camps, and certainly didn’t cause the genocide of the Jewish people, and never harmed a soul”, I would hope that you would disprove your friend and show him all the documented historical records and evidence of the holocaust to convince your deceived friend of the truth.

If your sibling was convinced that gravity didn’t exist and was just a figment of our imaginations and was planning to jump off a very high cliff to prove their point, I hope that you would stop them rather than “respecting” their beliefs.

Some claim to be moral relativists. If a fellow coworker or classmate decided to bring a bomb to your office or school claiming it’s a good and moral thing to blow up your fellow coworkers or classmates, citing overpopulation as the reason, and attempting to convince you that work/school is oppressive and needs to be stopped - would you say anything or would you do anything? I hope you’d stop them, rather than being “tolerant” of their false beliefs.

People commonly say today, “Every person has to define right and wrong for him or herself.”

Tim Keller, again from the Reason from God argues in response, “Is there anyone in the world right now doing things you believe they should stop doing no matter what they personally believe about the correctness of their behavior?”

Of course you can think of someone.

When it comes to math, science, history, and even morality, we certainly don’t believe in the concept of relative truth or accepting all truths as equally valid. Truths are to be tested to see if they are true. In the same way, all religions should be tested to see if they are true.

If I say there is only one God and one path to heaven and you say all paths are equally valid and there are actually a plurality of gods or there is actually no god at all, one of us has to be wrong. We can’t all be right.

If I say there is a moral code given by God and you say there is no such thing as morality and all have to decide morality for themselves, one of us is wrong.

If I say there is only one way to heaven (namely through Jesus Christ), and you say there are multiple paths to heaven and you can believe in whoever you want, somebody is wrong.

We can’t all be right.

You should not simply believe in whatever you hear, you should test to see if it’s true.

Which worldview makes the most sense?

Which religion seems to demonstrate the most truth and reason?

Which sacred scripture are actually verifiable by historical records archaeological records, and with the human experience?

What religion/viewpoint provides meaning, purpose, significance, hope, and a future? 

What religion helps me understand the world in a way that is helpful, constructive, and beneficial to myself and others and promotes human flourishing? 

These are the significant questions that one must carefully answer to figure out what is true and what isn’t.

3. Does Christianity claim exclusivity?

Unequivocally, yes.

Jesus Himself states the exclusivity of Christianity multiple times throughout the gospels:

John 14:6, “Jesus said to him, “I am the way, and the truth, and the life. No one comes to the Father except through me.”

John 3:16-18, “For God so loved the world, that he gave his only Son, that whoever believes in him should not perish but have eternal life. For God did not send his Son into the world to condemn the world, but in order that the world might be saved through him. Whoever believes in him is not condemned, but whoever does not believe is condemned already, because he has not believed in the name of the only Son of God.”

Mark 12:28-30, “And one of the scribes came up and heard them disputing with one another, and seeing that he answered them well, asked him, “Which commandment is the most important of all?” Jesus answered, “The most important is, ‘Hear, O Israel: The Lord our God, the Lord is one. And you shall love the Lord your God with all your heart and with all your soul and with all your mind and with all your strength.’”

Furthermore, all over the Bible, the entirety of the Bible claims the exclusivity of Christ:

1 Timothy 2:5, “For there is one God, and there is one mediator between God and men, the man Christ Jesus”

Acts 4:11-12, “This Jesus is the stone that was rejected by you, the builders, which has become the cornerstone. And there is salvation in no one else, for there is no other name under heaven given among men by which we must be saved.”

1 John 5:11-12, “And this is the testimony, that God gave us eternal life, and this life is in his Son. Whoever has the Son has life; whoever does not have the Son of God does not have life.

Christians are not “closed-minded”, “intolerant”, or “unloving” because they claim the exclusivity of Christianity, that’s what Jesus Himself and the whole Bible teaches. If I claimed to be a Christian and said that all roads lead to heaven and it doesn’t matter what you believe or how you live your life, I would not be a true disciple of the Lord Jesus.

Unequivocally, Christianity does claim exclusivity. However, the offer of mercy and grace and forgiveness found in Jesus Christ is offered to every soul, regardless of gender, sexuality, race, color, age, height, income, background, or creed. Galatians 3:28 tells us, “There is neither Jew nor Greek, there is neither slave nor free, there is no male and female, for you are all one in Christ Jesus.” Yes Christianity is exclusive, but it’s the most inclusive religion in the world. All are welcome to come to Christ.

When you think about how Christianity started and where the message of the Gospel has gone, Jesus clearly cares about all nations and peoples and tongues and tribes. Christianity started with a small group of people in the middle east, to spreading across the entire roman empire, to Europe, to Africa, to North America, to South America, to Asia, and across literally the entire world. It is the largest and most widespread religion of all time with over 2.4 billion total followers comprising 31% of the worlds population today according to the Pew Research Center.

So yes, I believe that Christianity is the one true religion because that’s precisely what I’ve come to see and believe by examining and evaluating the claims of the Bible, the claims of Christ Himself, the miraculous resurrection of Jesus and the teachings of Scripture. No it’s not an unloving or bigoted thing for Christians to claim exclusivity, that’s precisely what Jesus Himself taught.