Be Happy Without Religion!

After the attacks of September 11th, 2001 conservative Christian leader Jerry Falwell said "I really believe that the pagans, and the abortionists, and the feminists, and the gays and the lesbians that are actively trying to make that an alternative lifestyle, the ACLU, People for the American Way - all of them who have tried to secularize America - I point the finger in their face and say "you helped this happen."

"Well, I totally concur, and the problem is we have adopted that agenda at the highest levels of our government" Pat Robertson responded. He doesn't mention that his own third - rate law school was busy infiltrating the "highest levels of government," later claiming to have 150 graduates working in the Bush Administration.

The now thoroughly discredited Tom Delay said concerning the Columbine shootings that he received a letter reading "Dear God: Why didn't you stop the shootings at Columbine?' And God writes, 'Dear student, I would have, but I wasn't allowed in school." Similar comments were made by many religious leaders after the recent Virginia Tech shootings.

Fox News has Bill O'Reilly and Sean Hannity railing against the "Secular - Progressive agenda." If you listen to the rhetoric, you might think that the United States is going to hell in a hand basket, and the only way to stop it is to get on our knees. But do the facts bear this out?

As it turns out, no. There is a direct link to measures of social ills and religion. Generally, the more religious a nation is, the lower it rates statistically on social measures such as divorce, violence and homicide, poverty, social justice. More secular nations have less disease, better education and literacy rates, better gender equality, and better treatment of minorities and those of alternative lifestyles. The only indicator where more atheistic nations score lower is in suicide rates.

There are differences in countries according to their level of industrialization, so for the purposes of this article let's only look at the so-called "First World" countries. Therefore we are throwing out results from some countries where one religion is forced on the people by the government. This actually skewers the results toward the argument for religion. Those nations who force one religion by decree do very poorly in all the criteria. I have also discounted China from the atheist numbers, as it is forced government policy. The nations where so-called "organic atheism" flourishes - that is where people are free to choose to be religious or not to be - are compared.

Of the industrialized nations, America has the highest church attendance rate. It also has the highest murder rate and the highest rate of divorce. And within America, the "bible belt" fares worse than the blue states. Louisiana has the highest church attendance, and its murder rate is more than twice the national average. Washington State has the lowest church attendance in America. It's murder rate is only 38 percent of the national average.

A Christian writer here on associated content bemoaned the fact that atheists and agnostics have the lowest divorce rates in America, while evangelicals have the highest among any single group, in her article Evangelicals: Why do we have the highest divorce rate? According to the study cited, evangelicals came in at 33 percent, just below non-denominationals at 34 percent. Atheists and agnostics came in at 21 percent, the lowest of any group. And the study was done by a Christian research organization, The Barna Group.The trends also hold true throughout the industrialized countries of the world. The less religious the countries are, the lower the rate of divorce. The only exceptions are Italy, Ireland and Belgium.

When the United States is compared to its peer nations - that is other industrialized countries, the trends are clear. The extremely secular nations are safer, healthier, better educated, more charitable, and have generally higher overall standards of living. Of the peer nations, the United States is the only country that denies its citizens universal health care.

While the facts don't necessarily mean that adherence to religion means a less socially advanced society, they do point to that conclusion. What is certain is that a "secular - progressive" belief structure will not lead to America's demise, as the Falwell's and O'Reilly's will have you believe. Consider other adherents to the fundamentalist doctrine of the Christian right. Sean Hannity, Ann Coulter, Tom Delay, George Bush, Pat Roberson, James Dobson, Michael Savage, James Kennedy, Ted Haggard, Janet Parshall, the list goes on and on. Of course there are good people in the movement too, but they are being led by the likes of those mentioned.

Perhaps a person should consider the words of Thomas Jefferson, written in a letter to his nephew. "The Christian god is a three headed monster; cruel, vengeful and capricious. If one wishes to know more of this raging, three headed beast-like god, one only need to look at the caliber of people who say the serve him."

Sources: www.seuclarhumanism.org, www.barna.org, www.creationtheory.org, www.associatedcontent.com/article/137829/evangelicals_why_do_we_have_the_highest.html?page=2