Belief is like love – a self generated projection. Can you dig a 14 year old boy who is madly in love with a girl, even when the girl is not even aware about the boy’s existence? Alas it doesn’t matter for the boy; his entire life is consumed with obsession, dreams, desires and longing. Love and belief are the strongest disruptions.
Religion conversely is like marriage, its main definition is fragility. Religion or marriage are in constant struggle with the world, the passions, the senses; for this reason marriage and religion have to be vigilantly guarded. Of course there are social benefits for the arrangement (more for some than for others). And to be sure just like there is an occasional statistical love in a marriage, there is an occasional belief inside a religion. But just as a marriage, a religion has to exert all its energy on preserving the delicate union, the pact that is often at odds with all that makes us human.
Further Reading:
Two Reporters on Religion Turn on God
The Unforeseen Consequences of a Religion
Love and the Fear of Death
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