Dave, I'm suggesting that everyone, myself included, should keep asking questions and be careful not to just unquestioningly accept conformity of any sort, whether it be religious conformity OR secular conformity...if they wish to keep learning about life and to keep growing in their understanding.

There is no rational reason for anyone to object to such a suggestion, but one thing I've found is this: if people are absolutely determined to take offense over an opinion or an assertion of some sort...then there is no way one can avoid offending them when discussing the subject...although one may have no intention of offending them. And if they are deeply afraid of change (as is the case with both religious extremists and anti-religious extremists), then they will be offended by any suggestion that they question their usual set of assumptions.

They don't need to be offended. There's no real reason for them to be offended. But they still get offended anyway, because they want to get offended, and there's nothing that can be done about it except to avoid talking to them in the first place about the subject they are so sensitive about....which if I were in 3-D life here is exactly what I would do. I would avoid talking to them about the stuff they are determined to take offense over. Here I don't have that choice, because I don't necessarily know who is going to open the thread and read what I have written here, and I have no way of avoiding various people who are hellbent on taking offense over opinions and ideas that weren't intended to offend anyone in the first place.

I'm merely discussing something I'm interested in. That's what people do. There is nothing here to be fighting over.