Throwing the baby out with the bath water...?

Just ploughing through the 1st chapter of the  Religion For Atheists by Alain de Botton (Wisedom without doctrine) and picking out the interesting bits.



 

 

"One can be left cold by the doctrines of the Christian Trinity and the Buddhist Eightfold Path and yet at the same time be interested in the ways in which religion deliver sermons, promote morality, engender a spirit of community, make use  or art and architecture, inspire travels, train minds and encourage gratitude a the beauty of spring"


"We invented religions to serve two central needs which continue to this day and which secular society has not been able to solve with any particular skill:

1. the need to live together in communities in harmony, despite our deeply rooted selfish and violent impulses.

2. second, the need to cope with terrifying degrees of pain which arise from our vulnerability to professional failure, to troubled relationships, to the death of loved ones and to our decay and demise"


"Religions merit our attention for their sheer conceptual ambition; for changing the the world in a way that few secular institutions ever have.  They have managed to combine theories about ethics and metaphysics with a practical involvement in education, fashion, politics, travel, hostelry, initiation ceremonies, publishing, art and architecture..."

Over the past year I have become more interested in why people follow religions/come to faith.Sometimes I wonder if it is just an accident of birth that we end up following one religion or another - or at least until we are old enough to make our own decisions. Sometimes, in fact many times, I have doubts about the whole thing. Why do I have doubts - the 64 million dollar questions? Many reasons - many of which are personal but I can see the 'benefits' of some aspects of religion which is why I am reluctant to throw the baby out with the bath water...