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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote]Make good choices and be a moral person, and you can forget about the rules of a specific religion and forget the issue of whether there is a God or not - none of that is helping you to be happy or be a positive member of society. [/quote]

Well said.[/quote]

So you don't think religion can help an individual be happy or be a positive member of society? [/quote]

I think certain features of certain religions can enhance a person's life -- community, ritual, music, traditions, a set of morals, a way of looking at life - and that these things can also be found outside of religion[/quote]

These are also things that can worsen people's lives:
Community based on religion is exclusionary - it means people who live together but are of different religions can be excluded from each others' church community. A Catholic friend of mine lives in NC, everyone in his town goes to some evangelical church and they keep telling him that he's missing out on all these great events so he must convert. These statements sometimes leave his wife in tears.
Ritual - Whether the ritual is positive or negative depends entirely on the content and message of the ritual. What about when the little Catholic girl turns to the little Jewish boy in school and says "You're going to Hell and I'm not because I got to take Communion and you don't get to."
Music - can't you have music and appreciate the music of the past without belief?
Traditions - this is so vague I dont even know how to respond. Traditions like Priests abusing alter boys? Pogroms? Crusades? Suicide bombings?
A set of morals - ahh, relief for the lazy, who cant decide for themselves whether blowing up a building or refusing birth control is a good or bad thing to do. 
A way of looking at life - Like "I'm not responsible, it's God's plan" or "It's okay that life sucks for those people, they will be happy in heaven"?

Don't like those examples? Want to pick your own examples? Go ahead - but consider who is doing the picking - YOU ARE - you are deciding what's good or bad, not the church. Well, [b]suck it up and take some responsibility for your choices[/b][/quote]

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