Church of the Churchless

Tai Chi has taught me that flowing is way better than forcing

I've been learning Tai Chi for about thirteen years. That makes me a near-beginner in this oh-so-subtle "soft style" martial art. Before taking up Tai Chi I studied "hard style" martial arts for about the same length of time.

So I guess I've reached sort of a balance point.

My previous Tai Chi-related posts are here, on my other blog. For some reason I haven't written about Tai Chi for five years. This hasn't been from a lack of interest. It must be because Tai Chi is something I do and experience much more than I think about it. 

Well, lately I've been thinking about what I've learned about flow from my Tai Chi practice. Which is closely related to softness, another core Tai Chi principle. 

Probably the most frequent advice I get from my instructor, Warren Allen, is "relax," "softer," and "don't try so hard."

And this is after thirteen years! When I started learning Tai Chi after those karate-focused years of training, Warren said those things way more often. So... some progress.

It's so easy to try too hard. Forcing usually feels more natural than flowing, because we're used to trying to accomplish things through effort, energy, determination, strength. 

But what Tai Chi teaches -- this is basically Taoism expressed through physical movement -- is that flowing with someone's movement, even if that movement is a punch to your face, is a highly effective way of dealing with both bodily and psychological situations. 

Partly this is due to the weakness of strength and rigidity. 

When someone tightens up (again, either physically or mentally), this creates a lever that can be used against them. For example, if someone grabs your wrist with a tight grip, your moving forward, backward, or to the side will take that person in the same direction, since they've connected themselves to you. 

This principle is sort of akin to the adage, "the bigger they are, the harder they fall."

Redirecting a punch with a soft, flowing movement will have more of an effect on the person making that strike if it was done with a lot of force, because there is more energy in the punch. Hence, more energy in the redirection. 

So if someone is angry with you, responding softly and flowingly (albeit firmly, in a sense; Tai Chi doesn't advocate becoming a limp marshmallow) should result in a better outcome than responding in kind: harshly, strongly, emotionally. 

"Better" refers both to how the other person feels and, equally importantly, how you feel. 

Probably the most important thing I've learned from my Tai Chi practice is this:

My primary goal throughout my daily life shouldn't be to achieve this or that, because often that isn't under my control. Rather, I need to focus on feeling a sense of flow and softness in whatever I'm doing, rather than a sense of tightness and tension.

Of course, being relaxed often leads to a better outcome. But this is more of a side benefit.

I've learned that if I view flowing and softness as a means to an end, this produces rigidity in me, because now I've attached myself to that goal in much the same way someone grabs hold of a person with a strong grip. 

It's tough to flow when you're attached to something.

So what works better for me is to view flow as a good in and of itself. If I feel myself getting tight, anxious, upset, or tense, I try (but not too hard!) to relax, let go, flow -- trusting that whatever comes from this will be fine, and without worrying very much about what that whatever might be.

Hopefully I've said something here that can be understood. This is a difficult subject to write about. Like Tai Chi, it is subtle, personal, internal. Regardless, I've enjoyed this attempt to put into words what I've come to feel more than I've thought about it.

Indian and Greek thought are both dualistic. Chinese thought isn't.

Oneness has a lot of appeal.

It's simple. Nothing is simpler than one. (Well, maybe nothing is simpler, but since there is no way to know what nothing is like, since it doesn't exist, who knows?)

Also, oneness has a lot in common with love.

Love brings us together, which is a big step toward being one. Duality, on the other hand (a good phrase to use when talking about duality), posits two things that are inherently different.

Like most people, I've had the idea that Eastern forms of spirituality are more into oneness that Western forms are. The cartoon above captures the notion from a Buddhist perspective. It's difficult to imagine a Christian or Jewish version of the joke.

The Greeks were the source of Western dualism. Here's an excerpt from a book that I'm enjoying a lot, Jeremy Lent's "The Patterning Instinct."

The eternal soul, Plato explains, knew all about the immutable world of Ideas before it was incarnated. At birth, when the soul is forced to leave the world of Ideas and become fused with a mortal body, it forgets most of its previous knowledge. Thus, the goal of philosophy, in purifying the soul from the body's pollution, is not to learn new truths but to rediscover the Truth that was already known to the soul prior to its incarnation.

...Here, in Plato's cosmology, is the beginning of the cascade of dualism that would structure the European tradition of thought about the nature of humanity and the universe all the way to the present. In this constellation of ideas that would become endemic throughout Western civilization, the human capacity for abstract thought is linked with the soul, which, in turn, is linked with truth, and truth with immortality. The body, as part of the changeable material world, is associated with sensory appetite, ignorance, and death.

Soul and body. Heaven and earth. Truth and illusion. Spirit and matter. Good and evil. Eternity and time.

These are the sorts of dualisms that have split the Western mind for thousands of years. ("Mind," by the way, has largely replaced "soul" since Descartes. But many, if not most, Westerners still believe that mind has an immaterial basis, as does consciousness.)

So Eastern forms of thought and spirituality attract people who are turned off by the rigid dualism of Western religions. In my case, I embraced Indian philosophy because I believed it was markedly more into oneness than Christianity and Judaism. 

Well, over the years I changed my mind.

The form of meditation I learned from an Indian guru was intensely dualistic. It was aimed at leaving behind awareness of the body and senses in order to experience a form of "soul travel" that led to knowledge of realms beyond the physical. 

You can't get much more dualistic than that. 

In these passages Lent explains how ancient India embraced a form of dualism that differed in some respects from that of the Greeks, but still was based on the same sorts of splits found in Christianity. After quoting from the Maitri Upanishad, he writes:

The realization of oneness in breath, mind, and the senses seems a long way from the Platonic notion of the separation of mind and body. In fact, an influential school of classical Indian thought is known as advaita, which literally means "not two" and is frequently translated as "nondualism." 

Does this mean, then, that the principles of Yoga transcend the dualistic mind-body split that India civilizations inherited from its PIE [Proto-Indo-European] forebears? Further investigation shows that this is not in fact the case.

First, we need to consider what the term advaita refers to.

Is it saying that body and mind are not two, that they are really just different aspects of one entity? Not really. Its core teaching is based on the foundational idea that atman equals Brahman, that the world of maya is illusory, and that although things seem separate from each other, if you keep peeling the onion and look to the inner reality, you will see that everything is ultimately part of Brahman.

Rather than resolving the mind-body split, advaita teaches that relinquishing the body and all other conditions of existence is necessary to realize the true identity of atman and Brahman. 

So if someone is looking for oneness, it won't be found in either Greek or Indian thought, which are both thoroughly dualistic.

Pleasingly -- because I'm attracted to Chinese thought, especially in the guise of Taoism (and Tai Chi, basically Taoism expressed as movement, which I've been practicing for 13 years), Lent is big on the Chinese way of looking upon the world, which he admires as being in tune with modern scientific thought and a naturalistic approach to oneness.

Here's how he concludes his chapter on "Dualism and Divinity in Ancient India."

The belief in the divinity of everything in the universe ultimately differentiates Indian thought from that of the Greeks. In Greek dualism, only humans possess the faculty of reason that enables them to achieve the lofty heights of divinity. For the Greeks, the ultimate Truth attained by reason is to be found above the world, separate from the world, in a dimension of eternal abstraction.

In the Indian cosmos, dualism took a different form: the source of meaning is both above material things and hidden deep within then, and is glimpsed by piercing through both the reasoning faculty and the senses.

While looking in different directions for the ultimate source of meaning, both traditions agree that it's not to be found in the tangible world. It is in this sense that both are dualistic.

In the next chapter, we will explore an alternative understanding of the universe. In the ancient civilization of China, untouched by the migrations of Indo-European tribespeople, an unbroken tradition evolved from shamanic roots into a cosmology that demonstrated, by its very structure, how the human quest for meaning can take an altogether different approach. 

And I'd add, an exceedingly appealing approach for those, like me, who are tired of philosophies and spiritualities that divide, rather than unite, our world.

How this atheist feels about prayers after another mass shooting

Another day in America, another mass shooting. A lone gunman shot Rep. Steve Scalise and four other people at a park where Scalise was practicing for a benefit Congressional baseball game. 

This is a tragedy. So are the tens of thousands of other gun deaths that happen every year in this country. 

But after dramatic shootings like this one, there's a familiar ritual: "thoughts and prayers" are directed to the victims and their families. 

I wrote about this in 2015 after the San Bernardino shootings. Here's an excerpt from "Another mass shooting. No more 'thoughts and prayers.' Gun control ACTION!"

Another week, another mass shooting in America. At least 14 dead, another 14 wounded. And what are we going to do it about it?

Mostly offer our "thoughts and prayers" to the victims. And their families And the first responders. 

Which, obviously, does precisely zero, nada, zilch to stop the next mass shooting. And it will come soon. Because the next one always does.

Only in America do we have this much gun violence. Why? Because we have way more guns per capita than any other nation. So we have way more gun deaths. 

Responsible gun control is the answer. 

Thoughts and prayers are useless. They accomplish nothing (if a person directly affected by a shooting is told you are personally thinking of them, then they might feel a little bit better, but this rarely happens).

So, please Americans, stop with the thoughts and prayers.

All these rote expressions of sympathy accomplish is relieve your guilt that you're not doing anything to stop the needless gun violence.

Instead, ACT!

Look, I understand the urge to pray after something horrible happens. I used to be a religious believer. I've done a lot of praying myself. 

Now, though, I realize that (1) almost certainly God doesn't exist, so there is nobody to pray to, and (2) even if God somehow does exist, this is the same God who oversees the cosmos where the bad thing that stimulated the praying happened, so the God being prayed to is the God who allowed the horrific act to occur.

So when I see photos like this one of Democratic House members (also part of a baseball team) praying for their Republican colleagues, I think: I don't blame them for praying to their imaginary God, because they don't know any better; but if they think their praying is accomplishing anything, they're dangerously deluded.  

Why do I say "dangerously deluded" rather than just "deluded"? 

Because these people, being part of Congress, have a special ability to actually do something to prevent future mass shootings. In my 2015 post I laid out part of what I think needs to happens -- stronger gun control laws.

However, I realize that opinions differ about how to deal with the fact that the United States has way more gun deaths than any other advanced country (we also have way more guns). So I'm fine with lawmakers doing something other than what I want them to do.

I just want them to do something. 

Unfortunately, it's a good bet that after a few days, or maybe a week, of "thoughts and prayers," this mass shooting will fade out of peoples' memory. Then another one will happen, and the thoughts and prayers will start up again, with no actual action having been taken in the interim. 

This is the danger of believing in thoughts and prayers. Religiously-minded people feel that they've done something by thinking and praying, while in reality they have done nothing. 

Sure, most Americans believe in prayer. This doesn't mean prayer accomplishes anything. No study has ever demonstrated the efficacy of prayer. Which isn't surprising, given that there is no demonstrable evidence for a God who responds to prayers.

So as an atheist, I look upon displays of prayer in this country much as someone would look upon a "primitive" hunter-gatherer tribe dancing around a fire, singing and chanting appeals to their nature spirits to bring rain. These are supernatural myths that are an integral part of most cultures. 

Problem is, insofar as "thought and prayers" draw energy and attention away from viable actions to deal with a problem, these delusions are harmful to a society -- even though they may bring some peace of mind to individuals. 

I wrote "Why I don't like 'Our thoughts and prayers are with you'" after the Boston Marathon bombing.

Obviously my blogging power doesn't extend very far, because thoughts and prayers are still as prevalent now as they were in 2013. But at least I don't believe that simply thinking or praying accomplishes anything. 

Writing a blog post is taking some concrete action. Here's part of what I said in that post:

After the bombing I came across a Twitter Tweet by someone I follow, "scriptdave" here in Salem. He's a screenwriter with a great sense of humor. Also, some wise observations. He tweeted:

I respect the need people have to pray. But that prayer is meaningless unless you get off your knees and do something.

To which I Twitter-replied, "Amen." Later someone else commented on scriptdave's tweet. He told them:

I hear you. People need to reflect, meditate, process tragedy. But prayer being the end all is ludicrous. Do something real.

A double Amen to that. 

Good criticisms of Guru Gurinder Singh and his spiritual organization

I enjoyed this blog post comment from "reet" so much, I've made it into a post.

These are some great criticisms of how the Indian spiritual organization Radha Soami Satsang Beas operates, and the lavish lifestyle enjoyed by the RSSB guru, Gurinder Singh, and his relatives.

The RSSB guru travels in private airplanes and in high end cars with high level security, his son is the CEO of a multimillion dollar company, his wife has million dollar stocks to her name, his relatives are rich billionaires.

It's totally fine if you're a businessman and doing all this with your "earned" money but it doesn't look so good when you are operating a spiritual organization that preaches that you should not fixate on acquiring materialistic things in life and that main focus of life should be meditating and realizing god.

All the donations that are being made by the people thinking it's going to be used by their master for some greater good is sadly just used for land hoarding all across India in almost every single city to build satsang centres on vast acres of expensive land. For what ? To open them up for 2 hours once a week on Sunday to repeat the same satsang over and over again.

It's so sad to see people instead of helping each other are investing so much of their time and resources into organizations and "babas" like this especially in a country like India where so many die due to hunger and poverty everyday.

They claim that everyone is equal in eye of babaji yet they have different boarding houses for foreigners, NRI [non-resident Indians] and just common local people. They even have a different seating plan based on your level of income and your country of origin. If you are rich and famous or from another country you sit in the front. They even discriminate on basis of colour if you're white you sit in the front and if you're brown you sit behind the white people.

There are so many more things that just don't seem so spiritual about this spiritual organization.

No one has any luck even after years of meditation. Those who claim that they do, the ones I have met so far are my grandparents and it turns out their electrolytes were out of balance and they were confused and hallucinating.

Sadly, few people like this make other believe that this stuff is true. You know another persons hallucinations about god turns into another persons religion kind of thing.

It isn't all about us. Humans aren't special.

We have no option but to use our human ways of knowing to understand the universe. However, this doesn't mean that us Homo sapiens possess the capability of accurately answering all the questions about the cosmos that come to mind. 

Or even being sure that we're able to ask the proper questions. 

More and more, I'm embracing the conclusion that human consciousness likely isn't capable of grasping the Great Big Questions (notably including why the universe exists at all), much less the answers to them.

Here's a letter from the June 2017 issue of Scientific American on this subject. I've also included the "Imagine No Universe" piece referred to in Dave Bolton's letter.

THINKING OF NOTHING

In “Imagine No Universe” [Skeptic], Michael Shermer explores attempts to answer the question of why there is “something rather than nothing” in the universe and the difficulty in defining “nothing.”

Why do we assume we have the potential brainpower to ever explain such mysteries? Could there not be aspects of the universe our human intelligence is unable to reach at the present time? Consider this: A dog travels in your car. Can it ever understand motor mechanics or geography? Your cat watches television. Has it any knowledge of electronic communications?

Why do we, just one of the species in existence, assume our brains are capable of knowing why we exist and what there is beyond infinity? This should not inhibit us in striving to understand the purpose of life, and so on. But we should accept that it may take a millennium of human development to know everything. Perhaps then we will become gods!

DAVE BOLTON
Essex, England

-------------------------
Why Humans Prefer to Be the Center of the Universe

Michael Shermer

Imagine nothing. Go ahead. What do you see? I picture dark empty space devoid of galaxies, stars and planets. But not only would there be no matter, there would be no space or time either. Not even darkness. And no sentient life to observe the nothingness. Just ... nothing. Picture that. You can't.

Here we face the ultimate question: Why is there something rather than nothing? I have compiled several responses from a number of sources, including a 2013 book by John Leslie and Robert Lawrence Kuhn entitled The Mystery of Existence (Wiley-Blackwell) and Lawrence M. Krauss's 2017 book The Greatest Story Ever Told—So Far (Atria Books).

Nothing is nonsensical. It is impossible to conceptualize nothing—not only no space, time, matter, energy, light, darkness or conscious beings to perceive the nothingness but not even nothingness. In this sense, the question is literally inconceivable.

Nothing is something. It is a logical fallacy to talk about “nothing” as if it were a “something” that ceases to exist. Here we bump up against the problem of defining what we mean by “nothing” and the restrictions that language imposes on the problem. The very acting of talking about “nothing” makes it a “something.” Otherwise, what are we talking about?

Nothing would include God's nonexistence. In Leslie and Kuhn's taxonomy of “nothings,” they list what categories of things might be included in “something” that would be negated by “nothing”: physical, mental, platonic, spiritual and God. If by “nothing” is meant no physical objects or matter of any kind, for example, there can still be energy from which matter may arise by natural forces guided by the laws of nature. Physicists, for example, talk about empty space as seething with virtual particles, from which particle-antiparticle pairs come into existence as a consequence of the uncertainty principle of quantum physics. From this “nothingness,” universes may “pop” into existence.

Nothing excludes creation ex nihilo. If by “nothing” is meant that there is no physical, mental, platonic or nonphysical entity of any kind, then there can be no God or gods, which means that there cannot be anything outside of nothing from which to create something. This negates the Christian theologian argument that God created the universe ex nihilo, or “out of nothing,” based on the English translation of Genesis 1:1 that “in the beginning God created the heavens and the earth.” This is misleading. Recent scholarship has suggested that the Hebrew word for “creation” in Genesis 1:1 is bara (ברא)—a verb that more accurately translated means to “separate” or “divide.” Genesis 1:1 should read, “In the beginning God separated the heavens and the earth.” Separated from what is not indicated.

Nothing is unstable; something is stable. Asking why there is something rather than nothing presumes “nothing” is the natural state of things out of which “something” needs an explanation. Maybe “something” is the natural state of things, and “nothing” would be the mystery to be solved. In his sweeping narrative, The Greatest Story Ever Told—So Far, a sequel to his 2012 book A Universe from Nothing, Krauss notes that “Einstein was one of the first physicists to demonstrate that the classical notion of causation begins to break down at the quantum realm.” Although many physicists objected to the idea of something coming from nothing, he observes that “this is precisely what happens with the light you are using to read this page. Electrons in hot atoms emit photons—photons that didn't exist before they were emitted—which are emitted spontaneously and without specific cause. Why is it that we have grown at least somewhat comfortable with the idea that photons can be created from nothing without cause, but not whole universes?”

One answer has to do with our discomfort with the Copernican principle, which holds that we are not special. We prefer religious and anthropic explanations that the universe was created and fine-tuned for us because they put humans right back in the center of the cosmos anthropocentrically—it is all about us. But 500 years of scientific discoveries have revealed that it isn't about us. From this fact, we may gain purchase on a perspective that engages both the religious and scientific impulse toward a sense of awe one gains from contemplating nothing.

Believers, be clear about what sort of belief you want others to accept

Someone recently emailed me, asking if I read the many comments (223, currently) on a recent Church of the Churchless post. Here's part of my reply.

I admit that I haven’t read the many comments on this post in much detail. In my current irreligious frame of mind it just strikes me as mostly meaningless to discuss/argue about subjective experiences as if they reflect some objective reality. There’s no way to tell whether someone’s supposed “mystical” experience is anything other than a projection of their own mind absent some sort of convincing demonstrable evidence.

 

Logical or reasonable arguments can lead anywhere. To me, most of the content of the comments is akin to debating the details of how unicorns look and act. The first question to ask is, “Do unicorns exist?” If they don’t, then it is just an exercise in creative fiction to delve into details of an imaginary creature. 

 

Philosophical debates aimed at how one lives in this world strike me as quite different. I read a lot of philosophy, both explicit and implicit. Finding meaning in this world clearly is a subjective exercise. But the world itself is objectively real, which gives meaning to the search for meaning. 

 

Trying to find meaning in supernatural realms and powers for which there is no evidence of their existence strikes me as a waste of time. And I say this as someone who has wasted a lot of time in this pursuit.

Here's another way of expressing what I was trying to say in my reply: believers should be clear about what sort of belief they are claiming is valid, and so worthy of being embraced by other people.

The basic distinction is between subjective and objective reality, as I noted in my reply. Now, I realize that "subjective" and "objective" mean different things to different people. But the dictionary definitions make good sense. 

Subjective: characteristic of or belonging to reality as perceived rather than as independent of mind :  relating to or being experience or knowledge as conditioned by personal mental characteristics or states

Objective: of, relating to, or being an object, phenomenon, or condition in the realm of sensible experience independent of individual thought and perceptible by all observers :  having reality independent of the mind

So let's say that someone speaks of experiencing God, heaven, or some other manifestation of a supernatural reality beyond the physical universe. For example, as in the above-mentioned comments, some people talk about astral realms, radiant forms, divine light and sound. 

I have no problem accepting that a person had an experience along these lines. After all, the mind is capable of creating many mental manifestations that are much different from everyday reality.

If you take a psychedelic drug, likely you're going to have profound personal experiences.
If you have a psychotic form of mental illness, likely you're going to have profound personal experiences.
If you meditate for lengthy periods, likely you're going to have profound personal experiences.
If you meet with a holy leader you're deeply devoted to, likely you're going to have profound personal experiences.
And if you deeply desire to have a certain religious experience, likely you're going to have profound personal experiences in line with that desire.

Naturally this doesn't exhaust the ways religiously-minded people can have deeply moving experiences of what seems to be a divinity beyond themselves. Every religion is awash with stories about devotees who have experienced a glimpse -- or a full-on encounter -- with the divinity they believe in.

I'm interested in these stories in much the same way I'm interested in hearing someone talk about going to Glacier National Park, a Monster Truck event, Paris, a Taylor Swift concert, or any other experience that leaves this person with an amazing feeling best expressed as "You had to be there to believe it."

Meaning, I accept that they had a profound experience. But I don't accept that this was an objective manifestation of reality.

Well, in the examples above the experience was of something objectively real, such as Taylor Swift. However, the person's experience of a Taylor Swift concert was their own, whereas the objective reality of the concert was independent of their individual mind.

In the case of religious, mystical, or spiritual experiences, often the discrepancy between subjective and objective is much greater.

After all, there is no shared experience of God, heaven, soul, spirit, or any other supernatural entity. All we have are descriptions of individual experiences, and there is no way to prove that these are anything other than the manifestation of a person's subjective mind.

So I wish religious believers would be clearer about what they claim to have experienced.

I had numerous profound encounters with what seemed to be a higher reality in my college days, when I imbibed LSD, mescaline, and other psychedelics. But I rarely, if ever, told other people that my psychedelic experiences were of an objectively real reality.

Yes, at the time the sensations I experienced seemed like a doorway to a higher state of consciousness. And maybe they were, in a personal subjective sense. Meaning, for me. Not for anybody else.

Yet religious believers often extrapolate from their individual personal experience of some supposed divinity and claim that their experience proves that the divinity is objectively real. Which, of course, it doesn't. 

"I had a subjective experience of X" is very different from "X exists as an objective fact." The first statement doesn't demand proof, because subjective experiences basically are unprovable. The second statement does demand proof, because it is a claim about universal reality. 

Why we can't rely on the Bible for social and moral progress

My avid-atheist wife just had her monthly anti-religion letter to the editor published in our local newspaper, the Salem (Oregon) Statesman Journal. 

Actually, her letter was published twice on the opinion page in the print edition -- yesterday and today. I'm tempted to call that a miracle, a sign from God tbat She is pleased with Laurel's message. (But for obvious reasons I'll resist that temptation.)

Here's what Laurel said. The paper titled her letter, "Why community must not rely on the Bible for social and moral progress."

Most social and moral progress in Western civilization has been brought about by persons free from religion. In modern times, the first to speak out for prison reform, humane treatment of the mentally ill, abolition of capital punishment, women’s right to vote, death with dignity for terminally ill, and the right to choose contraception and abortion have been freethinkers. They were also the first to call for ending slavery.

Many religious people owned slaves, and the Bible justifies slavery in both the New and Old Testaments. In fact the Bible calls for horrific punishments for many things that today would be seen as horribly barbaric.

Most people who cherish the Bible pick and choose what they take from it, and ignore or aren’t aware of the parts they don’t like. They believe the various rationalized interpretations that religious leaders have preached over the eons. Although the Bible is supposedly the “word of God”, it was written by flawed humans in ancient times.

The Bible does not apply to our current times. It does not provide highly civilized moral guidance for modern times. It is those free from religion who have helped our society become more humane.

Laurel Hines
Salem

So far there are 67 comments on her letter. One is from my wife. Here's what Laurel said:

I rarely comment on my letters because all I can hope to do with the letters is provide food for thought. It is very difficult to crack the entrenched beliefs of those with the "brain virus" of religion. Facts and arguments rarely penetrate all the rationalism, and long held beliefs that people in the hold of religion grasp onto with all their might (even unconsciously).

Research shows, however, that most people who finally break free of the grasp of religion do so in a long slow process of bits and pieces of facts that fit together in their mind (brain) with enough questions to cause penetration of the rationalization about what in reality makes no sense. Most people, however, prefer to give too little thought to religion to question it, because they want to believe so bad.

But what they don't realize, is that once a person breaks free of religious belief, they look back and wonder why they ever believed such things, like an adult looking back at firm beliefs about Santa or an imaginary friend.

My main complaint about religion is all the wars, persecution, condemnation and separation it has caused over the eons. If the world survives to long enough for humans to become enlightened enough to find a more uniting and more rational belief system (maybe Humanism), and gives up the ancient religions, the future humans will look back at the current religions and see them as archaic as the belief in the sun as a god, or the many other people, idols, or gods who have been worshiped.

And yes, I currently fear for our Constitutional separation of Church and State, which is currently being threatened (but is in the Bill of Rights).