I totally endorse this rant by Penn Jillette. Sure, what Mormons (and Scientologists) believe sounds batshit crazy to most of us. But is it really any crazier than what mainstream Christians, Jews or Muslims believe? Hell no. “Just more modern, not more crazy”, as Penn says.
I’m as confused as Penn is about how otherwise intelligent-sounding people can just spout crazy stuff and act like it’s totally normal. It’s especially scary when you hear it from politicians, the people who are supposedly running the country. Surely there should be a sanity test that you have to pass before you can be elected to public office.
He’s right, of course, though he could have made his point in about three minutes. Anytime somebody subscribes to a “belief system” they are signing up for a whole shitload of unexamined and unsupported assumptions. When these assumptions are looked at in the cold hard light of day it becomes pretty difficult to sustain them.