Here is a perfect example of religious "faith" at work. The "belief" that having "faith" in a brand of Christianity makes you a better person inside and out is the opposite of the fact that studies show such a "belief" in such a "faith" often has the opposite effect. But when a person is confronted with a fact that is at odds with their "faith," whether it has to do with the sun and the earth like the days of Galileo or whether it deals with whether Christianity makes you more moral or less, a person of "faith" is required to pick their "faith" over the facts, less they burn forever in hell for failing to do so.
That hell is seen as an afterlife, but it is mostly just the hell that comes from no longer being able to depend on a religion, by people who have never learned how to depend on themself even half as much as they've been commanded to depend upon their religion. See below...
https://www.bustle.com/articles/62411-raising-children-without-religion-may-be-a-better-alternative-suggests-new-research
https://www.latimes.com/nation/la-oe-0115-zuckerman-secular-parenting-20150115-story.html#page=1
I was raised in an insanely religious household, in which the fires of hell awaited those who failed to worship and obey "God," and the Roman Catholic Church was God's only means of communicating his moral standards to the world. Occasionally, God also allowed the Virgin Mary to show up around the world to warn the world that God was about to open up a can of apocalyptic-whoop ass on us all for failing to practice morals in accord with the Catholic Church - an institution that proved by its handling of is own pedophile problem it was no better at practicing what it preaches than even public high schools.
Never mind that the Roman Catholic Church changed its "infallible mind" about the morality of suicide, slavery, whether unbaptized infants go to hell, and much else. The Church has always assured the world that, if people don't obey its moral directions (rather than practice its many immoral examples), there will be hell to pay. And Mary showing up from time to time assures us that hell will start, NOT after we die necessarily, but as soon as when God decides it's time to burn the whole planet to ashes as a complete failure, as part of his "divine plan"! Praise God!
No wonder new research shows that believing in such fantasies is not only harmful emotionally, but also undermines a child's ability to determine facts from fictions and fantasies. Here are some exerts from studies that show how and why children raised in homes that were NOT as insanely religious as the one I grew up in are so much better off as they grow up, and how that translates into healthier people, families, and communities. In short, it is impossible to have "peace on earth and good will toward men" when practicing a religion that characterizes suffering as sacred.
“Many nonreligious parents were more coherent and passionate about their ethical principles than some of the ‘religious’ parents in our study,” Bengston told me. “The vast majority appeared to live goal-filled lives characterized by moral direction and sense of life having a purpose.”
A troublesome report from the BBC last year found that religious children were less likely than their nonreligious peers to distinguish fantasy from reality, based on a study conducted by Boston University. Presented with realistic, religious, and fantastical stories, children were then asked whether they thought the story was real or fictional. Researchers found that “[c]hildren with a religious upbringing tended to view the protagonists in religious stories as real, whereas children from non-religious households saw them as fictional.” And why is this problematic? Because it muddies the waters of a child’s differentiation between reality and fiction, and even the spiritual from the fantastical.
See: https://www.bbc.com/news/blogs-echochambers-28537149
Study: Religious children are less able to distinguish fantasy from reality
My own ongoing research among secular Americans — as well as that of a handful of other social scientists who have only recently turned their gaze on secular culture — confirms that nonreligious family life is replete with its own sustaining moral values and enriching ethical precepts. Chief among those: rational problem solving, personal autonomy, independence of thought, avoidance of corporal punishment, a spirit of “questioning everything” and, far above all, empathy.
And this is the case because, as the studies go on to explain, "Secular adults are more likely to understand and accept the science concerning global warming, and to support women’s equality and gay rights. One telling fact from the criminology field: Atheists were almost absent from our prison population as of the late 1990s, comprising less than half of 1% of those behind bars, according to Federal Bureau of Prisons statistics. This echoes what the criminology field has documented for more than a century — the unaffiliated and the nonreligious engage in far fewer crimes."
On the flip side, those who believe in a God who is fully justified in treating Sodom and Gomorrah as if they were the twin towers of the World Trade Center, also see they are equally as justified whenever they are inflicting similar destruction upon anyone they deem to be offending - and therefore paining - their own brand of God. This is why Christians burned witches and heretics, for example, shifting the suffering such people who believed to be caused their Jesus back onto those "sinners" who failed to conform to Christian ideals. And like hell, fire is God's preferred means of correction and punishment.
My family is still deeply addicted to this cult of sadism masquerading as altruism, but rather than ever face their truth about their brand of "truth," the former they reject because it conflicts with the faith they feel they must have on the latter, they continue to blame anyone who dares to point out the problem. Christians, as such, far more often act like those screaming "crucify him" toward those offering a different perspective of their brand of perception, than to actually pick up the cross of having to challenge such spiritual dependence, and risk being crucified by their fellow "true believers."
No wonder I became an atheist toward their Roman brand of "God."
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