"the poll found that most Americans (51 percent) believe that religious conservatives have too much control over the Republican Party. That was a record high. By comparison, a plurality (49 percent) said they don’t believe that secular liberals have too much control over the Democratic Party. That too was a record high."

And in response to the Pastor Worley incident, the author says the following:

"Moderates and independents are turned off by this kind of bigotry and vitriol. This level of hate keeps religious extremism fresh in the minds of voters even if it’s not on the lips of candidates. In the end, it is likely to drag down the Republican brand more than lift it."

It is a shame because Christianity is a wonderful religion.

"The people who want to take their country back might first want to start by taking their religion back."

I think...

I believe that organized religion is a bad thing in general.

On the other hand, until we devise something to fill that particular "need" in many people's minds we can't simply take it away. Yes, it would better if the country didn't have so many people on crutches, but the solution is not to confiscate all the crutches.

Somebody needs to offer an alternative to religion that the average person can really identify with and get enthused about. When that happens people will voluntarily give up their superstitions, but until that happens religion will continue to be only contender to fill that niche in the human psyche. Rational people need to become interested in finding a better way to fill that niche.

The first step is to put together a detailed enumeration of what psychological and social functions religions satisfies, and then find a better way (or set of complementary ways) to go about filling those needs. All it would take would be the right "genetically engineered meme" set loose in the wild to overrun, and within a generation or two, replace religion entirely. It would have to be a damn good meme, carefully and skillfully crafted, but it could be done if enough people cared enough about the problem to get serious about finding a solution.

I think what you describe is pretty much what all the *new* religions do - scientology for example.

but I would hope we could come up with something that functioned well without the need to invoke hatred and intolerance at every turn. Something like a secular or atheistic Buddhism (although that label could never be used. It's too "foreign" sounding to appeal to the NASCAR contingent of society). It might even have to wear camouflage, appearing to be a type of Christianity in the west AND simultaneously appearing to be a type of Islam in the east. It could appear as any number of "separate" religions operating under an umbrella organization with a master plan to gradually "re-unite" the separate branches over the course of a few generations.

The easiest way might be to infiltrate religious leadership all around the world and slowly (over the course of generations) bend those religions in a more rational direction. The obvious problem being that trying to get any two people to agree what constitutes a "rational religion" is probably impossible.

hatred and intolerance at every turn.

Perhaps what we need to do is to help people move towards those kinds of organizations, as opposed to inventing new ones.

I don't think there is any need for trickery or camouflage. IMHO, christianity and islam are not the problem and there is much good to be gained from both. It's the misuse of christianity that is the problem.

This is a part of the problem as I see it. When you talk about an umbrella organization with a plan, the potential for abuse of power grows exponentially. The more power an organization has, the more likely those within it will become corrupted.

I don't know, but your talk of camouflage and infiltration and a master plan make me a little nervous.

And I agree, the idea of a shadow umbrella organization smacks of "The Illuminati" and is pretty spooky. What's even spookier is that my sincere motivation might be to trick people for their own good, it sounds like something too sinister to even contemplate.

I think your heart is in the right place and that is what counts.

Discovery beats revelation any day.

While some choose to replace their religious beliefs with scientific beliefs, others will never find that replacement adequate.

The strength of science is that it is objective and impersonal. That is also why it is not suited to fill needs that are very subjective and personal. And while it is true that science can study the psychological and physical effects of meditation, science doesn't gather in the temple every Sunday morning to hear an uplifting talk and then to meditate for an hour. Technology can build a cathedral, but experiencing the awesome psychological power of the cathedral is not what technology is about.

The choice is either to deny the value of such so-called "spiritual" experiences or to defer to something very much like religion (and very unlike science) to fulfill those needs.

Science excites me like religion used to before I came to reject religion and embrace science.

and would not be surprised if people felt they got some of the same things.

For others who embrace both, I think they would describe something very different from the two experiences.

In the end, it's highly personalized.

Talk about putting it mildly!

ETA: Just noticed that Pastor Electric Fence thought 100-150 miles would be sufficient. Let's see. That's 10x10 to 10x15 miles square. Let's go with the low estimate for computational ease. That's 278,784,000 square feet. Pastor Squatbag wasn't specific, so we'll just divvy that up: 139,392,000 square feet each for "lesbians and queers" respectively, as Pastor Dumbfuck so quaintly put it. Supposing that 10% of the U.S. population are homosexuals, then according to the U.S. Census Bureau, there were 311,591,917 U.S.Americans in 2011 and 10% of that is 31,159,192 people. Divided by two is 15,579,596 people.

Now we're set: that's about 8.95 ~ 9.0 square feet per person. A 3-foot by 3-foot area. Not even enough room to curl up into a ball to cry. The penned people wouldn't die out from lack of reproduction. They'd die a lot quicker than that!!

Gawd. Sometimes I wish I WAS a violent person, instead of just a big old nerd.

You can't reason with crazy.