Is religion (in general) good?
There's two questions I want to explore, seen below:
1) Is religion inherently harmful?
2) Does religion have benefits, and do those benefits outweigh possible harm?
I've already shown my thoughts in this topic, but I'll share a summary to start:
1) Absolutely. Religion requires people to participate in faith, the practice of believing in something without evidence and/or while denying contradictory evidence. Most religious people are indoctrinated in childhood by parents or trusted adults, which means that this fundamentally anti-empirical idea with huge ramifications for someone's worldview is given to them by the people they most trust, when they're most vulnerable. When a religious person meets an idea which contradicts their religion, they must either continue believing in the religion and deny that idea no matter its merit, or get rid of something they've trusted their whole life, and lose all their ideas and beliefs built on top of it. Even more, many religions and religious groups impose harsh punisments for mild offenses (including non-belief,) inspired by their dusty holy book from whatever bygone age it hails. In general, trying to follow ideals set out thousands of years ago, when the scientific method and Occam's Razor didn't exist in a modern society where so much contradictory information is available always results in backwards or hostile behaviour.
2) Many people claim their religion provides morals and meaning to life. The first point is easy: if your religion is the only source of morals, what was it like before your religion was around? Communities can't develop without at least some sort of code of conduct, and religion can't exist without a society or community. Meaning to life? Many people find that in religion, and I wouldn't take that from anyone. But it is my belief that there are far better options to get your philosophy from.