Saturday, June 23, 2007

Why I'm down on religion

People sometimes ask me why I'm so down on religion. Here's a little story. I was talking to an Amnesty International worker the other day who was describing particular human rights abuses. She cited an example of a woman who was accused of adultery and was sentenced to be buried up to her chest and stoned to death. It's a horrible story and unfortunately quite commonplace in some parts of the world. Earlier that week the worker had spoken to a woman who was interested in donating to Amnesty. She had been given some information about what the organisation does (which contained the example cited above) and was reading it after she had signed up. The woman returned to the worker and said "You have to cancel my donations. I can't give money to a charity that would intervene in this situation. According to my religion, that woman should have been stoned to death".

That's why I'm down on religion.

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