It's time

[emjay]

From my POV, the main thing it teaches is the wrong attribution of responsibility, both in the sense of theists not giving themselves enough credit for their own achievements, ie 'god give me strength'... well maybe that strength was in you all along, and you alone are responsible for your achievements...and likewise, 'god please help me'... someone intervenes of their own free will to help and the next thing it's 'thank you god for helping me', what about the person who helped?. Basically misattribution of responsibility either way IMO, and in such a way that true self-esteem is never fostered not just because of this lack of responsibility, but also because of the supposedly inherent sinful nature.

I really don't know about that, any run of the mill religious person knows how to say thank you to someone who helped. It may upset some people that they don't get enough credit for what they do, but this can be seen in a negative way : why do they even need credit ? They should do good unconditionally, whether they get credit or not.

But sure, in real life we really do need approval, it just seems that religious people are capable of providing that, too.

I'm talking about this mainly from the theist's perspective. Ie the theist attributing responsibility for all good that happens to their god's intervention in one way or another, whether in their own mind, in the sense of inspiration etc, or in the behaviour of others again through god's inspiration eg the notion of god working through others. And at the same time attributing all bad to either their weakness or the influence of yet another external force, the devil. How can this sort of attitude ever foster any true responsibility or sense of self-esteem?