Quote:Certainly when religion is used to justify violence in political struggle (e.g. Latin America, the Middle East, or Northern Ireland) then it becomes evil. And, conversely, religion is used as a reason to persecute a minority population (e.g. Sudan, Iraq, or USSR), then again, if it weren't religion it would be something else (i.e. us vs them). In this way, religion is just another demographic point of difference by which some people hate on others.
How sure are you that religion is just a substitute for other "us vs. them" issues, and not a separate instigating factor over and above race, politics, nationality, etc...? Both the historical record and current events are full of some pretty brutal violence that appears, at least at face value, to be over religion.
As for the Iowa paper, I'd be interested to read it when it gets published. I suspect that almost all these effects wash out when you control properly for all the other variables, and for the impact of similar social groupings which are not religious. I certainly can't be sure of that, but it is perhaps indicative that the importance of religion to the teens themselves seems to have little impact. That suggests that it is not the doctrine or belief that is having the effect (or that teens have very poor self-awareness, which would shock nobody.)
I suspect what that is about, and probably what the paper is driving at, given her interests, is social capital. People who are well-connected, social people, with similarly connected families do slightly better at almost everything than those who are not, ceteris paribus. Church is a way of making those connections, whereas there is no similar associative group for the irreligious.
-Jester