Why religion should not vanish

[Ryantology]

1. Charity:

A lot of these donations involve spreading churches and the religion, and this is the primary point. Give them a Bible with their food. Get more heads to count. Why not just cut all the spiritual nonsense out and turn these churches into massive international charities? Will believers stop giving if they don't think God wants them to?

2. Crime prevention:

Compared to the level of devastation which results from religious exhortation, from terrorism to abortion clinic bombings to wars to somewhat less immediately violent activities such as institutional discrimination against unfavored groups of people (and there always seem to be so many!), it really doesn't end up as a net positive. The same person who won't rob a liquor store because he thinks God said not to is too likely to be the guy who shoots up a liquor store because he thinks God said to.

3. Ethics:

What use is a religion when the most important social rules are, as you said, universal? Removing those universally-recognized rules from any religion leaves you with nothing but a bunch of arbitrary rules designed to placate the sensibilities of those in charge of the religion. We don't need religion to tell us not to murder, and there is only harm in religion telling us things like gay sex is evil or that you'll go to hell forever if you don't love Jesus with all your heart.

4. Common cause:

If religion actually worked to create a common cause, we would only have one of them (and then there might be something resembling validity to claims of "one true religion"). All it has actually ever accomplished in real life is aggregating disparate elements only to the point where you have large, dangerous groups that view all others as competitors or threats.