Don't believe. Think.

Have you seen any controversial billboards lately? Atheists are getting more aggressive at standing up for what they don't believe. Some serious money is being spent preaching against preaching.

Religion has been a touchy subject as long as the concept has existed. It will continue to be a touchy subject because you can't tell someone what they believe is wrong. You can't tell them that because there's no way to prove any facts in religion. It's all about belief. And belief for some people is stronger than thought. Just like some people believe that they can bet the house and win the bet, or that "this time things will be different."

Humans have an uncanny ability to take something good and screw it up by making it better. We fail to realize that there are too many different meanings of "better" for all the different people, and one person's better is another person's worse. So rather than accept things the way they are, we try to make everybody happy, reducing something that was already good to a watered down, remanufactured version of what it was. Such is the case with religion. We took life itself, which is fine as it is, and tried to assign a greater meaning to it in order to make ourselves feel more important, and to give ourselves some comfort in a world full of mysteries. We're too impatient to let the meaning of life come to us at it's own pace, so we created a meaning for it – one that suits our needs.

Unfortunately, different people have different needs, and different versions of the "truth" have led to differences in belief; and people don't like it when you dispute their beliefs. It makes us fight, maybe even kill somebody.

Thankfully we have science to help find our way through the thorns of belief. Science doesn't take anything on faith. It doesn't accept what we want to be true instead of what is proved to be true. It tests a theory, and either proves it to be true or goes back to the drawing board for a new theory to test. Science holds fact above all else, and facts are true even in spite of our desires. The universe doesn't care about us, and it won't change to please us.

Well I guess some people need the support of their beliefs to get them through the day. I can see how existence could seem scary and lonely without divine design. Nobody wants to feel that we're on our own against the universe. But we're not on our own. There are billions of us here. Imagine if we all pulled in the same direction what we could accomplish.

We could try to pull together and still be sensitive to others' beliefs, live and let live, but that's the fundamental problem with religion. That is, once you accept that the ultimate authority is not on this planet, but rather a spiritual entity, you're potentially dangerous to the rest of us corporeal beings. Because when push comes to shove, are you going to do right by your fellow humans, or do right by your heavenly father? When faced with a choice between saving the lives of your brethren or saving your immortal soul, what's it gonna be? Is your responsibility to help make this world a better place for everyone, or to work for the greater glory of God?

Nobody can tell you what to believe, but I think if you stop and think about why you might believe something, you'll find it's because someone told you to. They may not have forced you to, but you're pretty much taking the entire meaning of life at someone's word. If you stop and think, examine the reality of belief, you just might realize that believing isn't enough. Believing is stopping short of thought. Stopping short of study. It's failing to do due dilligence to find real truth. Believing is giving up. Don't give up. We need you. Don't believe. Think.