You Should Abandon Your Religion Now

Is your religion really the way to "true happiness"?

You should abandon the doctrines and beliefs of your religion. If you must, go to church, synagogue, mosque, or community center. But stop advocating for religious beliefs.

You no longer need to say Jesus died for anyone's sins, or that Israel received the Torah from God, or that Mohammed wasn't a delusional asshole. I know that you know religious traditions are bunk. I know that you suspect no clergyman or theologian has any real idea about God, gods, supernatural beings and realms, and so forth.

But I am not focusing here on the falsity of religions. Instead, I want you to try dropping the pretense of belief. I want you to imagine what would happen if you simply acknowledged to yourself that religion altogether stops or retards your personal growth .

Here's how we know that religion is poisonous. First, have a look at the top five regrets of the dying, as summarized by Hank Fox:

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
5. I wish I had let myself be happier.

Now, let's consider each regret individually.

1. I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
The sine qua non of religion is to tell you how to live your life. Religion tells you the values and expectations to which you should adhere in your life. Yes, some values and expectations are good in some contexts, but the point is that religion has no intrinsic claim on how you live. Don't give religion authority that properly belongs to you.

2. I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
The regret focuses mainly on professional work--one should scale back on the 80-100 hour weeks and so forth. Those who wish they had not worked so hard tend to feel they missed time with children, spouses, and friends. But the practice of religion doesn't always offer time for relating with others. On Easter, for example, the family may go to church together, but then everyone is just sitting or standing there while the people up front yammer at them about zombies. The actual relating that's done on Easter is the egg stuff and the traditional meal. The public worship aspect of many religions is antithetical to individuals communicating with one another and relating. The real interpersonal and social activity that people love and need have no special dependence on religion, and religions often serve only to defer that activity.

3. I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
Religions by and large traffic in the suppression of feelings and intuitions. Are you uncomfortable with God's anger, misogyny, and penchant for killing (and see Exodus 4:24-26)? Are you in love with someone who does not share your religion or who is the same gender as you? Are you incredulous that so many animals and eight frakking humans could exist for 40 days on a single boat? Are you pretty sure that virgin birth is impossible for humans, and same for physical resurrection days after death? Do you think Pope Ratzi and Bernard Cardinal Law should be in jail? If you answered "yes" to any of these questions, then you must know that religion is not particularly interested to delve deeply into these questions today. The sages and fathers of bygone days tended to assume the orthodoxies were true, and reality would bend to accommodate. But now it's best not to think too hard about all the poop that would have been on the poop deck of Noah's Ark. It's impolite to say out loud that a sitting pope enabled pederasty and valued his "church" over the suffering of real people. Religions do not advise you to share your feelings. No, they tell you "to keep an open mind" about it all. They tell you God will help you carry your burden. In other words, they are telling you to shut the hell up and deal.

4. I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
Religions cast suspicion on anyone who is not part of the in-group. You are encouraged to stay in touch with friends only insofar as you talk to them about the Lord Jesus Christ or the wonderful way Allah has provided clarity in your life. Religion sets its own terms on your relationship with anyone and everyone: that's pernicious.

5. I wish I had let myself be happier.
This is the big regret, and the one where religions obstruct people the most. All religions talk about offering transcendence, a way to commune with something "bigger than yourself." They promise happiness as if it were a secret that only they knew. To religion, happiness is only defined and sanctioned by them. All else is not "true happiness."

And it gets worse. No religion is in the business of letting you be happy all by yourself. To religion, your happiness is selfishness. Your fulfillment is one step toward a society of Jeffrey Dahmers. Your independence is confusion. Your curiosity is foolishness. Religions are admittedly and decidedly opposed to your being happier; they favor instead your "voluntary compliance" to god-inflected happiness.

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Religion is bad, not just untrue. The happiness it offers is happiness you can generate yourself. The happiness it scorns is none of its business.

Can you imagine lying on your deathbed saying "I wish I had gone to church more often"? Who could possibly utter, "I sure regret not having davened a few more times"?

Life is for doing stuff, folks. And it's for engaging others, talking and sharing adventures with them. It can't be about denying bacon and making solitary wishes for blessings.

Lose religion. Let it go. This is not about hating religion or being an angry atheist. This is about life. Your life.

Don't you at least owe it to yourself to consider it?