Possible Letter to send to MP with The God Delusion Pledge

65. Comment #28167 by bitbutter on March 28, 2007 at 7:35 am

Reading other peoples covering letters has been useful, here's my version (NB. not thoroughly grammar/spelling checked!)

---

Dear xxx,

I have sent you a copy of 'The God Delusion' by Richard Dawkins. I hope you have the chance to read it and that you enjoy it as much as i did. Perhaps you will even find some of your beliefs challenged and change your mind about some things as I also did.

I believe we have a duty to attempt to understand our world and it's mechanisms to the best of our abilities, and to use our knowledge to minimise human suffering wherever we can. I firmly believe that religious faith and its promotion is counterproductive to this aim.

I think Richard Dawkins is in the best position to make this argument so i took part in a group initiative to send his book to Britain's MPs. I chose you as the recipient of my book because xxxxxxxxx.

The point from the book that resonated the most strongly with me was this:

The problem we face is that if we accord respectability to religious faith we must not only accord respect to religious moderatism (as our society does at the moment) but also to religious fundamentalism. The two are not qualitatively different, one is not an perversion of the other. They are both founded on irrational faith. Adherents to each differ from each other only in terms of how literally they interpret the words in ancient texts.

I believe that the taboo in our culture that has made it inappropriate to talk plainly about the core beliefs of the Abrahamic religions prevents us from having a proper discussion about the growing problem of fundamentalist violence (at this time Islam is in the spotlight, but inspiration for violence can just as easily be found in Christian texts).

There seems to be a distinct unwillingness to acknowledge that the motivation of religious fundamentalists who carry out terror attacks and other acts of violence comes from their supernatural beliefs, even when the attackers plainly tell us that this is the case. I believe that this refusal to see what's in front of our noses is a grave liability at this time.

There are many other issues addressed in the book that deserve discussion too but i will try to keep this letter succinct and let Professor Dawkins do the talking.

I'm sure you are very busy so if you only have chance to read part of the book i strongly recommend chapter 8 'What's wrong with religion? Why be so hostile?'. It should take about ten minutes to read.

Thank you in advance for your time and your consideration of the arguments presented here.

Yours Sincerely,

xxx

reposted from: richarddawkins.net
my: highlights / emphasis / key points / comments