Rational Hub

It might make some people feel good to talk about ‘‘a higher level of existence’’ or a ‘‘guiding force,’’ but there is no evidence for anything of the sort. I couldn’t and still can’t even figure out what such quasi-religious humbug means.

These liberal reconstructions also struck me as too far from what most people
in churches believe. The kind of religious beliefs that control people’s lives and
lead them to take stands on political and moral issues cannot be the watery spirituality that is vague enough to avoid conflicting with anything.

There is no point in going to Church or praying to something so indeterminate. No ‘higher level of existence’ could save believers or help them get to heaven or perform miracles or create the world. - Walter Sinnott-Armstrong

“Most Christian theologians have retreated from all the things that their religion supposedly asserts; they take a much more ‘modern’ view than the average believer. But by the time you’ve ‘modernised’ something like Christianity - starting off with ‘Genesis was all just poetry’ and ending up with ‘Well, of course there’s no such thing as a personal God’ - there’s not much point pretending that there’s anything religious left.

You might as well come clean and admit that you’re an atheist with certain values, which are historical, cultural, biological, and personal in origin, and have nothing to do with anything called God.” - Greg Egan

Marilla Ricker, the renowned lawyer and suffragist.

That sounds about right.