Do you see any benefits to religious faith?

[robvalue]

I can see one benefit.  There are people who are ONLY prevented from following a life of unrestrained depravity by their fear of what God will do to them.  If it takes going to church every Sunday and reading the Bible on a daily basis to keep these individuals from running amok in the pub with a machete, then I'm all for it.

Not to say that religionists can't behave startlingly badly (we all know they can), but for the handful who believe - deeply and sincerely - that their faith is all that keeps them from behaving monstrously...yes, I'd call that a benefit.

Boru

A lot of people do believe this, but it's just part of the indoctrination. I would expect only psycopaths, and not even all of those, would actually start doing this stuff when they lost their faith. I've heard many stories of people who genuinely believed it and then realised, "Oh, I don't want to kill people after all".