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Originally Posted by Mnemosyne  That leads to my next question, which is why do people become so defensive about their religion? |
To respond just to this one part, even though the rest of your points deserve acknowledgment as well, the main reason why people get defensive when their religion is challenged is because religion is based on faith. To a large extent, most people do not have a very firm belief in their religion, despite the amount of work that they put into it. For those people, they are building their self worth on a foundation of sand. (I find this a bit ironic, because many religious texts tell you to build upon a foundation of rock, while conveniently labeling their religion as just such a rock...)
If a person is working purely from faith, then they do not have evidence to support their claims, which means that they do not have a constructive way to debate and refute people who challenge those claims. If they can not support their perspective, they begin to see that what they have been doing in regards to their religion may have been for nothing, which is a direct attack against the ego.
Once you bring the ego into the picture, there is little chance of having a constructive debate. Instead, you see all of the defensiveness and closed-mindedness that goes along with the religious arguments that we have seen raging for centuries.
If people say that they believe simply because that is what they have chosen to believe, then there is no logical way to refute it. If the 'attacker' wants justification, then saying that the religion has brought peace and happiness into their lives is more than enough justification. If a person continues to challenge the religion after that, then it is safe to ignore them, because they just want you to be miserable.