Organized Religion

I will start off by saying that organized religion has accomplished many good things. Under the banner of religion, people have performed countless wonderful and selfless acts. On the flip side of that coin, even a cursory glance at almost any period in history will not fail to show just as many terrible acts committed in the name of God -- so many in fact, that, if I were God, I think I'd be tempted to change my name. Just off the top of my head, here are some of the more infamous occurrences where religion has been used as either an excuse or a cover-up for acts which God would no doubt disown if asked:

• Various parts of the Old Testament, which are awash in blood. One loses count of how many times one reads that God commanded the armies of Israel to fall on some city and wipe out every inhabitant, rape the women, slaughter the children, and burn anything that's still left standing.
• The Crusades -- or, come into the loving arms of Jesus or I'll gouge your eyes out, you heathen infidel.
• The Salem witch trials.
• Wars between the Catholics and the Protestants ravaging just about every country in Europe, and which still break out from time to time.
• Events in the Middle East, where it seems like the Old Testament just keeps on going.
• Racial segregation, intolerance and bigotry, which should be the last things one sees taking place in a church if the teachings of Jesus are understood and practiced.
• The Catholic church's current woes around pedophilia.
• Illegal Polygamy.
• Jim Jones and the 1978 Kool-aid episode in Guyana.
• The September 11, 2001 attack of the World Trade Center in New York City.
• The Branch Davidian massacre in Waco Texas.
• Various "televangelists" and their massive financial empires gained from defrauding gullible people.

So it's not difficult to claim that organized religion has a spotted history that leads right up to today. Of course the forces which have been antagonistic toward religion can also claim their share of the mayhem (see Nazism and Joseph Stalin as just a couple of examples). On the whole, though, one can't help wondering if, on balance, the overall effect of religion on the world's stage has been a negative or a positive one. Certainly it is a phenomenon which tends to divide people when uniting would probably be more productive and result in better outcomes.