@Dewy --
Have you ever heard of a
Poe?
Don't get me wrong; belief in God is a good thing when not taken to extremes.
I don't. I think that any belief system which lends itself so well and so easily to wholesale slaughter and genocide(in addition to such travesties as slavery and general bigotry) is a bad thing. The fact that the moderates, merely by looking everywhere
but religion for the cause of problems, provide a very thorough camouflage for those who
will kill for said system.
We're gradually coming to a time, a time where even the most destitute of terrorists or psychos could conceivably get their hands on nuclear weapons, where the toleration of such belief systems will be out of the question. In a time where all it takes is one person pushing a button to evaporate millions of people, can we risk such dangerous beliefs?
We already lock up people who we consider to be too insane, people who are a danger to themselves and/or to others. The only thing that really separates the ones we lock up from the ones who kill in allah's(or pick your deity, doesn't matter) name is that those who do the killing call their psychosis a religion. Obviously there's sanity in numbers.
Do I like such possibilities? Absolutely not. One of the most highly held scruples I have is freedom of, and thus by necessity from, religion. I despise the very thought of depriving someone of that right, but I'm practical enough to recognize that my scruples may not always be the best thing when I take into account the bigger picture.
(Unfortunately a disclaimer like this is necessary or I'll get the standard, and oh so tired, theist complaint that I'm "out to destroy religion". It's really not on my to do list, but it's something that I wouldn't hesitate to do should it become necessary, the right people have to life way outweighs any right we have to practice our preferred brand of insanity. And yes, our courts virtually always uphold this.)
What, did anyone actually think an itchy anus meant something?
It's really not that far-fetched. I encountered a theist six months ago who genuinely believed in something similar, and there are millions(if not more) of catholics who believe in Stigmata which are pretty much the same thing. So your Poe, whether you meant it to be one or not, wasn't all that spectacular.
