a:4:{s:2:"to";a:1:{i:0;s:19:"kglethean@gmail.com";}s:7:"subject";s:76:"[Provoketive Magazine] Why Christian Churches Should Lose Tax Exempt Status.";s:7:"message";s:2166:"Name: Clara
Email: burnett@gpri.org
Website: http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=100003405565566
Message: ), is that we as atheists do not eriuqre those we help to sit through a lecture, prayer, or other religious ritual first.  We do not hold those we help ransom to dogma.  We do not threaten them nor tell them lies.Having said this, I cannot deny when people find themselves in difficulty, that a belief in an all powerful deity who loves you and who helps you through a time of difficulty can be of great comfort and can really help one to find solutions to the problems at hand.  I myself underwent exactly such a process.  My own belief in Jesus was likely the only thing that kept me sane enough to eventually realize it for what it was:  A Placebo.  Once I began to understand what was happening to me, I was able to view my situation with a much better grip on reality.  It is clinging irrationally to those same beliefs that I object to.  I now think that having such religious beliefs are not a necessary part of the healing process if one obtains proper counseling when faced with emotional or mental difficulties.  At the time I went through this, I had no alternative so I deluded myself into believing it in order to survive long enough to get help.  Indeed, I can confidentially say that my religious upbringing was in large part (but not completely) directly responsible for the mental difficulties I had experienced.Again, the community aspect you refer to is being achieved by many other organizations that are not based on submission to religious dogma.  In fact, religion breeds intolerance and hatred.  The world would indeed be a better place if everyone were to based their morality on themselves, and not on some external God figure.  It would indeed be a better place if everyone would base their lives on reality, on real evidence and not on stories carefully crafted to keep us slaves to unquestionable authority.


Time: Saturday March 10, 2012 at 12:24 am
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