I know this comment isn't going to help, but here it is.
All religions encourage magical thinking. That is, they all insist that you believe something that cannot be proven through a rational investigation. The suppression of rational thinking what makes religions generally dangerous.
Can we find a religion that historically has caused more good than harm? Surely we can. Indeed, all religions do at least comfort their followers and that's got to count for something.
Unfortunately, the comfort given is a lie, albeit a small one. That benign lie often leads to more malicious ones and soon you end up with an entrenched clergy that harbors pedophiles or promotes genocide or exhorts xenophobia.
As far as I can see, religions to take the sting out of our mortality. If instead of running from this horrible fact, we embraced this one life of ours, perhaps we'd all be a little less crappy to each other.
(And no, religion isn't any more a basis for morality than another literature.)
Religion as a mental virus
All religions encourage magical thinking. That is, they all insist that you believe something that cannot be proven through a rational investigation. The suppression of rational thinking what makes religions generally dangerous.
Can we find a religion that historically has caused more good than harm? Surely we can. Indeed, all religions do at least comfort their followers and that's got to count for something.
Unfortunately, the comfort given is a lie, albeit a small one. That benign lie often leads to more malicious ones and soon you end up with an entrenched clergy that harbors pedophiles or promotes genocide or exhorts xenophobia.
As far as I can see, religions to take the sting out of our mortality. If instead of running from this horrible fact, we embraced this one life of ours, perhaps we'd all be a little less crappy to each other.
(And no, religion isn't any more a basis for morality than another literature.)