Religion: What it means to you

I am an Atheist. I regard organized religion of any sort to be nothing more than a disease based on fear, lies, and corruption. (Be aware that I hold a drastic distinction between organized religion and personal beliefs.) I hold nothing against those who practice religion, aside from those who would use it as a spring board to forward their own ignorant ideas and practices, ie. www.godhatesfags.com, but organized religion, in all it's forms, is one of the most destructive plagues ever to be released upon mankind. Some of the more general ideas I can agree with, but you hardly need religion to tell you not to kill someone or not to sleep with someone elses wife. The knowledge of right and wrong, while not always clear, is generally obvious and does not need to be thrown out there with threats of eternal damnation or some other form of punishment. If the only thing that stops a person from commiting an evil act is fear of divine wrath and not the act itself then there is something very wrong with that person. There has been some good to come out of religious practices but the good that has does not and will never outweigh the horrors commited in the name of "God," or whatever the deity invoked as justification is.

Again, please don't take this wrong and think I am attacking people who believe in this stuff. I hold nothing against you. People are drawn to religion for any number of reasons, mostly as a matter of geography, but also for emotional strength when life seems impossible and to ease fears of what is and what "lies beyond." I feel that people would be able to make it through without the crutch of religion but that is a personal belief and not something I would impose on others. If one feels religion really helps them cope and gives them answers they seek, good for them. However, having a personal belief system is vastly different than the majority of organized religions around the globe.

So, for myself, having no need for religion to answer questions I have about purpose or life after death or morality, because I do not feel that religion gives any real answers as to the underlying truth of the world in which we live, I am an Atheist. It's a personal choice and one that, I feel, is the only true way for a human being to live completely free. There is strength that comes from believing in a higher power, to be sure, but I think there is much more strength that comes from knowing the only way to better yourself is THROUGH yourself.

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