Reply #10: I hate that they are going to force us to purge the culture at some point.

[imdjh]

Religion was a part of my childhood. Not this kind of Fire and Brimstone religion, comfort religion. My mom still goes to church, and I try to hold my tongue about religion in public life when I am around her, because she's old and she finds comfort in it.

But historically, the old religion doesn't go by the wayside quietly. It has to be forcibly purged from the society. It has to be mocked and punished. Which would be unnecessary if these people weren't so incredibly obnoxious, but they are.

You couldn't have found a hundred students, much less a thousand at my high school who would have stood in a circle for the Lord's Prayer. That's because it was in an urban area of educated people. I don't like hurting the feelings of others, but as education goes up fundamentalism tends to go down. As economic prosperity rises, religiousness tends to decline. There are exceptions, as always.

These people aren't simply holding beliefs, they are passing this plague on to another generation. I'm sorry we don't have anything quite as comforting to replace it with. Most people don't get Buddhism or Zen in the same comforting way that spiritual reincarnation in the earthly personality in some blissful cloud top existence does. But if all they did was believe in heaven, then there really wouldn't be a problem. It's the stupid that goes with it that makes the whole thing have to go.