Arslan asked:

I am just very confused on a fact that we human beings are so intelligent but still we entertain the
notion of religion? Isn't it too contradictory as per human intelligence? I mean all I can think of religion
is a pure fiction and nothing else! Then why this talk about religion all the time? Why don't we humans
just move on? Why does religion still hold such an important part in humans life in most parts of this
planet?

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Whilst it is undoubtedly true that many religious people accept as historically true some very strange
stories, it is a mistake to equate the practice of religion straightforwardly with belief in those stories.
Consider, for example, that huge body of literature, the Bible. Within the Jewish and Christian
communities there can be found a wide range of attitudes to the Bible from, at one end of the
spectrum, those who would claim to accept it as true in its entirety to, at the other end, those who
adopt a sceptical attitude to much or even all of it. And it is important to recognise that to be sceptical
of the historical or literal truth of the ancient stories is not necessarily to dismiss them as having no
lasting value. Just as the greatest literature of the modern period conveys important truths and
insights in fiction, so also the ancient literature regarded as sacred within the faith communities,
conveys insights which we would be the poorer for neglecting.

Religion rests not only upon attitudes to sacred stories but also includes ritual, ethics and social
aspects which may be, or become, independent of the ancient founding documents. So if we are to
ask why religion persists in human society, we need to consider not only what religious people do
with their sacred stories, but also what value they derive from all other aspects of religion.

A footnote to this very brief response to your question: When studying religion and philosophy, you
are always liable to encounter belief systems and theories which may seem far-fetched, bizarre, or
just plain crazy. Whenever you do come across such strange beliefs, it is a good discipline to ask why
those beliefs should have seemed reasonable to those who held them. Sometimes they turn out to be
not quite so crazy as at first they appeared. Some, of course, are irretrievably silly and you will have
to draw the line somewhere. But discovering where to draw that line can be great fun.

Robert Crompton