When I was 12 years old, I realized that children brought up in a religion believe that theirs is the one true religion because their parents taught them so.

When I was 26, I asked my boyfriend who was raised in a strict Catholic family if he believed that Jesus was the Son of God. This was my first verbalization of doubt.

When I was 29, I started coming to terms with the fact that I do not believe in god(s) no matter how hard I tried to.

When I was 31, I told my ultrareligous family that I do not believe in god(s).

When I was 39, I thought that religion was a scourge upon humankind. I thought that it blinded us and stunted our emotional and intellectual potential. I thought it harmed us irreparably as individuals as well as parts of a worldwide whole. It possibly made us incapable of empathy for those who believed or thought differently. I thought it gave us an excuse to try to bend others to our will because religious people thought they had The Truth™ and were duty bound to defend it and/or promote it to the end. The Afterlife, the present life, politics - they demanded adherence, evangelism, ostracism of others, all in the name of one's religion of upbringing or of choice.

When I was 45, I thought that maybe only religious extremism was a problem. Maybe there is something to be said for the comfort some find in religion and ritual. Maybe religion in and of itself is not fundamentally bad.

At 49, I do not know what I think of religion anymore. I don't know if one can differentiate between religions in any substantive way. I don't know if a spot on the spectrum of progressive to conservative matters with respect to harm caused to an individual and/or group. I don't know if extremism is the dividing line between something that is innocuous and something that is dangerous. Maybe religion can never be innocuous. How does one define extremism?

What I do think at 49 is that certain aspects of religion, religious fervor, passivity of members despite disagreement with tenets and edicts...these will always be dangerous to the individual and to humankind.

Some people say that in an imagined world without religion, something would fill the void and have the same effects. Maybe that's true, but I don't know of a time in recorded human history when people have lived without religion. I think religion might be a base reaction to fear, ignorance, and uncertainty, maybe like racism is. I don't think that's too harsh of a comparison when the relationships between religion, racism, homophobia, and misogyny are so closely intertwined that sometimes I wonder which came first to justify the other.

All I know is what I've seen, heard, and learned while I've been alive, and from my perspective, religion falls far short of the mark of something beneficial to us.

Maybe a world without religion would be better if not best. What we have now is horrible.

Well, we had Communism as practiced in the old USSR and Communist China where the worship of the state became the religion and atrocities were and are still being committed in the name of ideology. I am one that believe that some other fanatical belief would fill the void if there were no religion, because human nature is flawed and gravitates towards certainty and being told what to believe in, whether it is Stalin, Allah, Jesus, or Chairman Mao.

I fully agree that our world today is horrid and full of hate, but religion is only part of the problem. The problem is fanatic belief in any cause that justifies killing, hatred, and cruelty for some imagined higher goal. I am afraid humans are hard wired to think that way, and if it is not one thing it is another.

I agree. It's more about human nature than anything.
We certainly have had the USSR and other atheistic societies engaging in atrocities as much as religious ones.

And Buddhism isn't known as a violent religion.
I think if one were to really sit down and study.it.out, the culprit would be human ego and thirst for power that is the real foundation

Are humans, in and of themselves, bad?

Yes. It is never okay to teach bullshit as truth. A quote I read here once sums it up perfectly:

"The good things about religion are not unique, the unique things about religion are not good."

Very enjoyable post Beth.

You say, "Some people say that in an imagined world without religion, something would fill the void and have the same effects."

The idea that there would be a void is false. And we could certainly do without the effects of religion.

Millions of years of evolution have left us with an understanding of the benefit of reciprocity. Empathy comes from within, from our own special set of genes written upon by our ancestors, not from a building with a steeple or a cross on it.

All religion attempts to convince that what they offer can be gotten in no other way. This is simply false. If religion were gone would we still not work together in harmony as much as possible? Look after the children and the weak? Haven't we gotten past slavery and racism and homophobia simply because society is becoming more decent at a steady rate as we expand knowledge and understanding, not because of supposed heavenly commandments?

I know how to be a good person without religion. For most, it is instinctual. The more we work together the better everyone does. It is natural that doing good for others benefits us as well. This is not religion. This who most of us are naturally.

Religion is already being replaced by human decency, human kindness. They are the antidotes.

Your thoughts make sense to me, as always. I too progressed from trying to make sense of religion to having quite enough to deal with in the secular realm.

is telling lies to people and raping children in and of itself bad ?

It's too bad more people can't find a personal God to believe in without being brainwashed by religion.

Why not believe in God, after life, reincarnation, etc. without having to pay someone as an intermediary? Bible writers knew exactly how they wanted to 'bind' people with 'fear' that they may go to some imaginary 'hell' if they don't 'believe the way they want you to' and 'pay' what they want you to pay, etc. etc.

Spiritism or something similar is a solution to that problem. I feel I have a personal relationship to 'God/Spirit' and can pray without having to pay for some man-made god 'save' me from an imaginary 'hell'.

ALL gods are man made.

I'd rather go by facts than make stuff up and just "believe" it, when there's no evidence any of it is real, thanks.

And you believe all sorts of contradictory secular bullcrap. Do you enjoy the mental gymnastics or what?

YES!

RB

Yes !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Believing false things is bad. All the religions I know about teach people to believe false things. So it kind of looks like religion is bad.

Yes, IMHO.

Because it's "belief" without reason, facts, evidence, or learning. It's "following" without questioning, understanding, or determining what's best for an individual.

There are "good" things some religions do some of the time. That they do those things are great.
They don't outweigh, IMO, the "bad" at the basis of religious belief. And nobody NEEDS to be in a religion or religious to do ANY of the "good" things religions sometimes do. And the "bad" basis of religion can and has led to some of the most atrocious acts in human history...based on superstition and ignorance.

Yes. Absolutely yes.

Any time they venture out beyond the golden rule, it goes downhill fast.

Religion seems to put a mask on discrimination and violence. The religious cite their beliefs as justification for their bigotry and hatred. Other than that, they seem fine.

Not necessarily. Keep in mind that religion helps people (think the late Mother Teresa) to do constructive things as well as destructive things. And there is a certain percentage of the population (I don't know the exact number) who have bought in to the religious thing so much that they would at least attempt to commit suicide if they found that religion wasn't true. The whole truth is that religion is a motivator for many, and if you were to remove that motivation, you would most likely see a sharp upward spring in U.S. suicides.

Believing in untruths is not a good thing. The truth is better than any pretty lie.