On Religion

I noticed in a number of Facebook posts a negative attitude towards reli-gion. I’m personally not a big cheerleader of big religion. In fact, I have written a book entitled “From Jesus to religion” that is not too flattering to wards much religion. However, I believe it to be an accurate and a fair appraisal of religion. (From Jesus to Religion).

Religion like all institutions of mankind is either good or bad or someplace in between. It is simply incorrect and unfair to say that all religion is evil. Yes, religion has its share of evil as all human institutions do. However, religious people still give the most to charities out of all of the institutions in the world. They provide a sanctuary for the poor and outcast of the so-ciety. They are the primary workers in nursing home visitation and workers at local soup kitchens and pantries. Statistics can be found in the book “Who Really Cares: The Surprising Truth About Compassionate Conservatism by Arthur Brooks”

The small congregation that I attend has given out thousands of dollars for fuel assistance and lodging to the poor. Religion has built the majority of our universities and hospitals to name a few, the Salvation Army, YMCA Habitat for humanity, numerous universities, and much more.

My conclusion is yes, religion has its bad apples and the reason it does is that the people that make it up are just human beings and unfortunately sometimes are terribly flawed. I’ll sum it up with the words of the apostle Paul “all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God” that includes the religious and nonreligious. In fact, we all fall short of our own moral standards. If you don’t it’s simply means that your standards are not high enough.