" Atlopinion, your rebuttal there shows all the symptoms of the sad brainwashing of Religious indoctrination. You cannot reason beyond the platitudes and fearful admonitions you've been taught to parrot. I truly wish that you--and everyone who thinks that a nonbeliever has a miserable existence because they don't have a shred of "faith" in God--could spend a day with me and just how little that matters AT ALL! I wish you could see the happiness that I have found SINCE renouncing my Christianity--but just like that little polygamist wife who testified at the Warren Jeffs trial, I feel the need and desire to speak out against and change what I (and many others who stop me at the local grocery store to tell me "thank you") believe to be the brainwashing and psychological abuse of religion! And NO ONE EDICT/BELIEF ENCAPSULATES THAT BETTER than Maguet's sad assertion concerning works/grace! MAN IS NOT INTRINSICALLY "UNWORTHY"!!! That--THAT!--is abusive, twisted and SICK to teach children. Christianity uses the classic language and tactics of abusers! Destroy a person's self-worth so you can control them! BS!! Yes--it IS horrible to teach kids to believe, to have "Faith" (which is the silly habit of believing in UNPROVEN propositions) in things for which there is NO PROOF! This sets up s dangerous precedent in a child's mind! If you'll blindly believe in UNPROVEN things, you'll fall for just about anything, as long as it's couched in the right language! "Faith" stops intellectual curiosity dead in it's tracks! "Faith" kills "Reason". "Faith" is the thing that drives all the murderous Religious wars and fanatics across the world! "Faith" , it can probably be proven, is DANGEROUS!!! Teach children to question authority, to seek the truth, to re-examine what has been taken on "Faith"! If more people had done that, we might not be in this damned, murderous, bloody, wasteful, unwinnable war! I COMPLETELY endorse "faith" in mankind, in love, in the promise of better days, and I hope for America and the world to come back to America's SECULAR ROOTS, but I'm not holding my breath--which is exactly why I will continue to speak out. You "Evangelicals" and your damned "Faithful" president have already SCREVVED UP THE FUTURE waaaay too much to just be silent anymore and to allow you to dominate the press and push your agendas any more! YOU PEOPLE VOTED IN THIS @$$#OLE WHO IS RUNNING THE FUTURE OF AMERICA'S KIDS INTO THE DIRT!!!! "

" You are a complete waste of my computer screen. Did you actually just write that teaching kids faith and hope is dangerous? You are putting faith in a document yourself and then telling me why I must believe it. People who use christianity or whatever faith they may believe are to follow that faith. Believe in that faith and not stray from its writings. Those who do stray from its writings are not true to their faith. Man has faults. They were given free-will. God himself is perfect and it is him who we must set our lives after. Those who kill, rob and lie are not following so please do not just because they say they have jesus believe or put them in the same realm as those who do follow the word. Our country was founded on the law of God. It is those who continue to try to break the restraints of God's Law that are running our country into the ground. When ALL is washed away all that is left is Faith, Hope, and Love. If that is something that you cannot agree with and you want no hope and no faith in anything although you use it in every part of your daily life I feel sad for where your life is and how you fill it to bring peace to your heart. "

" Besides, atl-- I'm not saying that believing in a "just and loving God" would be a bad thing--if you could prove to me that it exists. And what I'm saying is that. until you can withOUT "faith" (Prove it empirically, that is) it's just plain stupid and irresponsible to teach kids that "believing" in something unproven and having "faith" that you're going to be able to just wash away all those nasty things you did just cuz you DO believe--thats a good way to teach someone that it's OK to be a rotten person--as long as you "believe"! Shouldn't we be teaching our kids that DOING good is REALLY the measure of a man's "worthiness"???! I mean, what's your rebuttal to that? (You too, DD!) "

" Its troubling to me that both you DD and atlopinion are apparently unable to come up with a sincere and intelligent rebuttal to both this letter and my comments posted below, so you resort to diversionary arguments. As for the "certainty clause" built into the study (of which I happen to have a personal copy)any learned person would know that that is, in today's cultural atmosphere, a necessary addendum to the study in order to give the authors a little "wiggle-room" and not to so inflame the theists so that the report would not be even taken seriously, or characterized as "extreme" and dogmatic. You believe what you want to believe, atl; the study in it's entirety speaks for itself. "

" Karl, while you are googling around the internet to try to expose such harsh injustices as believing in a just and loving God. Why dont you go back to your the gold mine to your letter the "Journal of Religion and Society" and read the research note shown in the 2006 archives that states that " What one can state with certainty is that one cannot in any way be certain as to the effects of religiosity and secularism upon prosperous democracies at least as based upon the methods and data of Paul’s study." Keep typing into the google search box. I can do that too! "

" Karl--Do I hear the sirens again. Why are you still "calling the fire department to a fire YOU say doesn't exist?" Why are you spending so much time bashing religion when you say that there is no higher being. Are you the guy who approaches the crazy man on the street and is the mediator for his agrument with an imagined foe? P.S. I know many people that had horrible parenting, and because of religion, are upstanding members of society. Why can't you just let people believe if they want to instead of trying to "debunk the myth?" "

" I agree, cm--this IS nothing but a repetition of some of my previous arguments--but sometimes you have to tell these Evangelicals two or three times before they see the light! I mean, consider the absurdity--I PROVE to Maguet that there are contradictory verses--even cite them-- and what does he offer in response? "We need to read and study the Bible more"!?!?! I mean, that translates to me as "We should memorize the Bible even MORE so that we are able to selectively choose the Bible verses that fit our needs and conform to our pre-formed opinions" Don't you agree? Thinking that way bleeds into just about every aspect of a person's life--they wind up cherry-picking through facts and glossing over truths until they come out with very distorted views of an argument. Just like all the Evangelical Bush appointees who have corrupted all the public offices and helped form Policy on the war, Abstinence campaigns, taxes, etc. This is not, NOT the way we should be teaching our children to think! BTW, your other comment about me using "God" makes no sense whatsoever--how am I supposed to talk about Religion and not use the word "God"? Stupid. It is noteworthy though that YOU had nothing at all to add to the argument. Do you NOT think my argument here has some validity?!! Try to forget your pride, your stubbornness and your loathing of conceding a point to me, and let your critical mind do the typing? "

" Sure Karl,and thats why everyone is migrating from the Northeast to the South and Midwest. Thats where all the sin is!!!!! "

" This really is a repeat of words from "2-cents" during the week..As usual you have nothing "new" to add to your debate! And for someone who is a "non-believer" you certainly use the word "God" alot in your statements over the months of debating religion-maybe you should "come out of the closet" "