By losing religion we lose very little, but gain very much

While it might be brave to have faith in claims of religion, the truth is this is a sacrifice of reason humans do not need to make.

When we make this sacrifice - surrender our ability to reason to somebody else, we are losing much and not gaining anything we cannot possibly experience without religion.

Humans can be good without religion. Without religion humans can still know truths about the Universe - as a matter of fact religion does not help there at all. Without religion, humans still love each other. Without religion, we can still be curious about the World. Not only that, but religion actually robs us in that regard. If we believe literally in stories from religion or use known philosophical arguments about god to “prove” to ourselves that god was necessary to create the Universe, we are far from being curious about the Real World. We then think we have all the answers – and without any evidence. The truth is – humans have the better answer to those questions. Not ultimate answers, nobody has them yet, but at least without religion there’s no delusion about having them.

So, after some introspection, it should be clear that taking religious ideas literally doesn’t get us much. There are better answers out there. Plus, there’s no law requiring that we have to take everything that religion offers. We can choose not to believe religion literally, and still cherish the stories as a metaphor.

If we lose religion, we more-or-less only lose an illusion that we know everything. And we can still keep the metaphors if we like. So, let us have a different kind of courage! Let us have the courage to face reality and experience truth and beauty without being told how to do it. We can do this!