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You're backtracking Chris... Focussing on the wars or the illogic of the bible will not work, has never worked, and will never work. This is because Christians and Muslims and Jews believe their religion is the word of God before they know the religion. This is the first step.
In fact, addressing the religion at all is an effort in vain. This is not important.
The most important thing in Judaism and Christianity and Islam, is to have a personal relationship with God, and more specifically the God of their holy book.
The rules and regulations are not important... in fact, many devoted Christians will do things completely opposed to things in the bible such as adultery or theft or murder... This is because as long as you have a personal relationship with God, nothing else matters.
However, depending on the individual, all of the Abrahamian religions silently dictate that in order to successfully have a personal relationship with God, you must be obedient to him. The less obedient, the less you feel his presence. And once this presence is felt, it is so beautiful and uplifting, that like drug addicts, a devotee will do almost anything to feel it over and over, or continuously.
This provides a vector... a push of action. And the bible, or whatever holy book it may be that a follower may believe in, provides the veins for this necessity of action to manifest itself. Depending on the individual, they will focus on different veins, like water, gravitating towards whatever fits them the best.
So if one is a warrior, then they will focus more on the warrior duties outlined in the bible. If one is a healer, they will focus more on the healer duties outlined in the bible.
But it is all secondary. All the action is a means to provide a clearer and more pure relationship with God.
The problem is that this is bondage: One should be able to feel the presence of God through one's own morality and convictions... it should be a choice not a necessity.
The purpose should be to uplift oneself from normal ground, not take oneself out of a hole. It is relativism. What may seem pure and beautiful is just normal to someone who is not in bondage.
So what the Abrahamian religion does is lower you by converting you to a sinner, then provide you normalcy (which you regard as a beautiful Gift) through a relationship with God, and this relationship with God can only be sustained when you perform his will which is outlined in the holy book.
Since we are all made to feel guilty in society for everything we do, Abrahamian religions find a very easy home: They provide compensation for our own personal guilt by giving us a means to repent for them. So instead of feeling guilty alone and in the dark, we feel guilty and compensate for this by going to Church, or converting others, what have you. It provides the veins by which guilt can be compensated for.
This means that the solution is to remove the guilt from the individual. The guilt imposed on an individual by the religion is secondary... there must exist a guilt that propelled them to attach it to the religion.
For example, if one is made to feel dirty by their parents, unwanted or a failure... they will inevitably feel guilty. When they look in the mirror they will despise themselves and have no way out.
There are many forms of escape that can take place... drugs, alcohol, sex, video games, amongst others. But they are all fixes that do not accurately address our need to feel guilty, and to compensate for this guilt.
If this individual encounters Christianity, and Christianity tells him that Jesus knows you're a sinner, and he can forgive you if you love him... you fit that situation to a tee. You're overwhelmed by guilt and self-loathing, and rather than fight the sources of this (such as bad parents or an unfair society) you compensate for it.
A good metaphor would be an infection. You can clean the infection every day, and you can disinfect it, and you can bandage it and walk around every day feeling that you've taken care of your wound and are a responsible person, or you can research the infection and remove it so you no longer have the duties that attach you to it.
Your life has become accustomed to these duties, and you almost need them for normalcy. Losing them feels like you would lose yourself.
But the wound of guilt, of self-loathing, is nothing more than an infection. And it does not form the basis of anyone's true personality. Nature has yet to create a creature that despises itself with validity... because everything is beautiful and everything is purposeful.
"Hating everyone protects me from elitism."
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