Religious suffering is, at one and the same time, the expression of real suffering and a protest against real suffering. Religion is the sigh of the oppressed creature, the heart of a heartless world, and the soul of soulless conditions. It is the opium of the people.
Karl Marx, Introduction to Critique of Hegel’s Philosophy of Right, 1844.
Christian Death, Sex and Drugs and Jesus Christ, 1988.
Christian Death album art depicting Jesus shooting up heroin.
Since religion makes people feel good, why criticize it?
Why am I responsible for their feelings? I’m debating in the world of ideas. I have ideas I’m fond of too, but I don’t carry on as if other people are under some kind of obligation to avoid criticising them. If I think they can refute my argument I adjust it, if not then I offer what I consider to be a rebuttal and wait for the comeback.
No-one would ever offer this feeble argument about any other subject. No-one says that monetarists should be left to enjoy their monetarism free of critical analysis, or that people who derive comfort from believing that JFK was murdered by the Illuminati should have their beliefs treated with kid gloves.
jonecc
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