>>>Agreed. Further iteration: the churches are mostly trading with people's feelings. Show me a church which never accepts donations, doesn't try to impose rules on its members and doesn't try to expand, and I may change my mind.
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>>Don't throw the baby out with the bath water. For all the hypocrisy you see in organized religion (Catholic priests sexually molesting the altar boys, TV evangelists using prostitutes, etc.), there is a lot of very good work done with those donations.
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>OTOH, there's probably an equal amount of good work done outside churches as well. They act as focal points.
>
>What I initialy meant was more raw: show me a church which will refuse money. Why do they have to have such buildings, golden stuff inside etc? Sometimes it seems that though Jesus had kicked the merchants out of the church, they remained at the door.

I agree. I have a large number of religious friends, and they atend beautiful churches. Why the money is spend on expensive staind-glass windows, I don't know. Why the money isn't spent somewhere else, I don't know. But, they still do good work. And a lot better work than I do. *g*