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All right friends Greg Kogel, stand a reason and thank you for being part of our show today. I want to start out by answering a

question that was asked me on a recent meet the teacher, meet the instructor, the kind of thing that we do on occasion with

instructors instructors for

stand a reason university and I think all of us have done this. All of us who have been involved in making classes. If you don't know about

STRU, that is our way of kind of adding more in-depth education on a particular topic. I just recently did one on the issue of moral

relativism for example and I actually got an email from stand a reason. I mean I received my emails too you know because I like to see what we're

what we're doing and what other people are getting and there was a little teaser like one episode of that particular STRU

and I watched and I thought that's not bad. I think that anybody who watches that teaser so to speak which was one

episode is going to see the value of the STS, stand a reason university and hopefully sign up for a course. But I just

those who have taken courses have a chance I think three courses or more have a chance to be part of an interaction

with an instructor on when I'm a kind of live interaction they go on Facebook or wherever we go. I don't know if somebody else pushes

the buttons for me and we interact with people and answer questions. One of the questions came up though I thought was really

helpful for a kind of a wider use and that is what's the first question I must ask to develop my own

convictions about religion. What is the first question I must ask to develop my own convictions about religion?

I think that's the way I was put. I wrote it down and I like that way of characterizing it and plus the

question properly presumes that when it comes to questions like religion what we're trying to find out is what is

true about reality. We are not just trying to find a religious club that makes us feel good. Remember it was marks that

said religion is the opiate of the people that is religion is what you take to make you feel better. It's a

drug. It doesn't have any benefit in itself apart from lifting your spirits and making you feel better

about the world. Now of course if what religion tells you isn't true about the world then I'm not sure why it

lifts anybody's spirits to believe something that is not true but in any event that's the way a lot of

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