Religion

I've got to mention this upfront: if I say "everyone" is one way or this "never" happens or that's "always" true, please understand that I think absolutely nothing is guaranteed or could be proven to the point that nobody could possibly come up with any reason to doubt it. (That sentence is sort of an oxymoron or something, isn't it?) Also, I often say absolute words like those for emphasis, and don't mean them literally all the time.

It can be very difficult to express your beliefs about stuff that you can't quantify, especially through text. I, conceded as I am, think I am really very good at arguing, but it's always tough to argue about religion. See, I figure that most of us are the religions our parents are, and are probably quite brainwashed into sticking with that religion. Even if we are provided with overwhelming evidence and reason, we bull-headedly refuse to agree that a religion other than our own could be even close to correct, and our own is certainly correct. I may or may not be an exception to this, but can't be certain because, you see, I'm the same religion as my father! It's too bad; if I honestly had different religious beliefs than my parents, I might have a better perspective on this sort of thing, but nobody has ever made a more convincing argument about what is or is not correct about religion, in my opinion, than my father.

It seems to me that an immense amount of people angry or confused about religion who want to express themselves or convince others that they are correct will dish out examples of great spiritual people and the history of religions and statistics and describe what is or is not moral and what is or is not humane and what is or is not going to be rewarded, and this all gets very repetitive. I hope to steer clear of these worn out ways to convince other people of what religion is or is not correct if I can.

Lots of religions have have been invented. Even if we were to, for argument's sake, assume some religion is absolutely correct or that many religions draw from the real truth of the universe, there are going to be LOTS of religions that just contrast too much and aren't true. The few people who feel that every single religion has a small amount of truth unique to it or, worse yet, the people who think every religion is 100% correct, are idiots. Perhaps idealistic, good-hearted people who want everything and everyone to be correct and happy, but still idiots. With that in mind, I'd like to point out a few reasons why someone might want to invent a religion.

First off and most importantly, most of the religions that exist provide security. They say something to the effect of 'do good things and you will be rewarded, and do bad things and you will be punished.' Just for the record, "doing good things" in most religions would include making the world better and faithfully following that religion, while doing bad things would be, well, the opposite. That isn't always the case, of course. A Satanist's idea of "doing good things" would be more like faithfully following that religion and making the world better place specifically for Satan, which might be very bad for the rest of us. Whether we take a religion like Christianity that says to be kind, moral and faithful or a religion like Satanism that says to be destructive, immoral and faithful or another religion like Buddhism that says to be happy and humane, they all sort of promise the same thing. You will be rewarded for following them. You'll go to heaven or be praised in hell or have good karma and achieve enlightenment or whatever. The knowledge that doing good things or following a higher power will reward you really comforts many people. I'd even say most people. If you walked up to just about any figure of religious authority (a priest, monk, rabbi, diabolist, etc.) and told them "no matter what you do or why you do it or who you do it for, you will not be rewarded or punished by any divine force or higher power or by the will of the universe, because none exist and you were not made for a spiritual reason," they might do anything from saying "I'm sorry you feel that way. I hope you change," to punching you right in the nose.

Whoever comes up with anything that convinces people to be good and makes them happy is probably a very wise person. Though they may know that their creation is just a lie, they could sleep well with the knowledge that they've made the world better. Really though, isn't it a comforting thought to know that the actions you take will definitely have consequences appropriate to how "good" they were?

Second, the majority of religions insist that there is some form of existence beyond death. Many atheists believe that at the end of your life, you will simply shut down forever, like a broken computer. It won't be like sleep; you will no longer think or dream or exist, as far as you know. You wont know who you are or what you have done in life, but you wont mind, because you will not feel. You wont even question why you don't know these things, because you will utterly lack the ability to. Your body will rot and be broken down, and that is the end of you and all of existence, as far as you know, forever. Quite a grim thought. I would much, much rather believe that when I die I will come back to life as someone new or meet the creator of the universe and live with it forever. Living with the thought that when you are dead your mind (and "soul," if it happens that you believe in souls or that minds and souls are different things) is just as active as your body seems quite unpleasant to me, though it honestly seems likely. I think if you asked someone who has never ever heard of religion or spirits and has been a hermit for their whole life if the fish he ate for lunch is still thinking about fish things, but is simply no longer in its body, he would say no and that there are no grounds for thinking that. Similarly, if you had a robot that could walk around and was constantly running calculations on its own and displaying them on a big screen but then one day it stopped walking around and no longer displayed anything on the big screen and in fact did nothing noticeable, say do to a lack of electricity, the scientist who built it would probably tell you "no, along with moving and displaying, this robot has stopped calculating all together. It hasn't begun calculating in some undetectable alternate dimension or in the body of another robot, but has simply stopped."

I would give anything to believe that I will keep thinking after I die and will live on forever in some way. Not 'in the hearts of my friends and family' or anything like that, but in a way that I could notice. It's almost difficult to believe that at some point in time nothing, not even myself, will matter to me and my nonexistent opinion.

You see, both of these things that the vast majority of invented religions provide, a sense of karma and an afterlife, are extraordinarily appealing. Does the correct religion provide these? I hope so.