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The importance of religion for many people is that it explains how the world came into existence ("Because God created it") and the purpose of their life ("To worship God and do his bidding"). However, these explanations make no sense upon close examination. In particular, 'explaining' the existence of the world as an act of God requires the believer to explain how God was created -- surely he did not create himself -- and this means that the 'explanation' leaves more unexplained about the world than before the 'explanation' was developed. Likewise, 'explaining' one's purpose in life by saying it is to 'serve God' implies that God's purposes are known, whereas in reality we know nothing about "God's purposes" except what is told to us by the babbling of religious fruitcakes.
There are dozens, and perhaps even hundreds or thousands of religions, all of which claim to be 'absolutely true', and all of which contradict one another in fundamental ways. The only reasonable conclusion that can be drawn from this is that all of them are absolutely false. In recognizing the above facts, those of an ecuminist bent have argued that, while all religions are probably false in some ways, the fact that all (or at least most) have the same core beliefs about God and morality imply that the true religion is constituted of these core beliefs. While this argument has a superficial appeal, it does not in fact prove the truth of the core beliefs, but only -- at most -- their usefulness: It proves that human beings are similar in the basic moral rules and mental props (god-belief) needed for a stable society
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