Other things religion had absolutely nothing to do with:

The Crusades - a bunch of European Xians went temporarily insane, as we would certainly recognize today with our 21st-century hindsight. During this bizarre and unexplainable spell of mass insanity, they marched from Europe to the Middle East and thousands of Jews and Muslims suddenly became dead. Apparently it was really just sort of a big vacation trip that went wrong. Nothing to do with religion.

The Witch Hunts/Inquisitions - some people actually believed witches existed! Ha Ha! Isn't that funny? But again, with our 21st century knowledge, we can only feel sympathy for those poor deluded folks who were suffering so badly with mental issues that they believed witches existed. Surely they got absolutely no pleasure from using the thumbscrew or the rack or the stake.

Thirty Years War - still nothing to do with religion. Just a big real estate dispute, basically. The newcomer Protestants wanted some property formerly belonging to the Catholic Church...like their whole countries...and negotiations broke down. After which SOME religious people MAY HAVE behaved rather badly, though we can't really be sure. This happily did free up a lot of real estate, like the towns no longer needed by all the dead men, women and children littering their streets.

I could go on for days, but won't...

Glad you've seen the light re: religion, Onager.

Julie

Hell, He wouldn't even need to use the booming voice from the heavens or the burning bush, just "speaking to one's heart", or some "other way of knowing" that we atheists are too dense and closed-off to understand. But, you know, "mysterious ways" and whatnot. Besides, I'm told it's wrong to question the deeply-held beliefs of others, except when it is, but apparently I'm not religiously enlightened enough to know when it's appropriate.

does the right thing and steps forward to defend her right to practice her beliefs without the secular government and its court system interfering.

Or Ted Cruz.

That quote could apply to the note, the sermon, or many parts of the bible.

Giordano Bruno, 1600. Party Host: Cardinal Bellarmine.

Michael Servetus, 1533, Geneva. Party Host: John Calvin.


They invited Galileo to one of these festive parties, but he signed a document renouncing his beliefs, in order not to go to the party and be the guest of honor. Allegedly he muttered under his breath, "Eppur se muova" (but yet it moves), referring to the movement of the Earth, as the Church fathers thought the Earth, Sun, Moon and other planets did not move. The Earth was in the center of the solar system and everything else revolved around it. Galileo's sighting of the four easily seen moons of Jupiter, in different places on different nights, and the movement of sunspots across the face of the supposedly immovable Sun was heresy.

Did GOD....god now.... not a sermon..... tell you to START?

Ancient superstitions are dangerous sometimes!

In my opinion, that person has a serious problem.