Voltaire famously said “Anyone who can make you believe absurdities can make you commit atrocities”. Rarely has there been a more perfect encapsulation of the dangers of belief. In India, a young disabled man named Bakshish Singh was beaten to death when a rumor had spread that he had torn pages out of Guru Granth Sahib, which is the holy text of Sikhism.

He reportedly tried to run away after committing the sacrilege and was caught by locals. As the news of the alleged incident spread, villagers gathered at the gurdwara and beat him.

Ah yes, the good old fashion mob beatings. You know that it didn’t take long for people to mercilessly pound a young man for the made-up crime of sacrilege. The real crime is the snuffing out of a youth with a history of mental illness. Rather than show compassion, which religious people continue to pretend to have, they showed only the darkest aspect of the human animal.

I think it’s telling just how brutal religion can be when the veneer of civilization is stretched thin. In rural India, the old ways still dominate, and it’s terrifying. How many other countless lives have been lost to the madness of the crowd, drunk of revenge for grievances against their imaginary friends? It all makes me sad, especially when I still overhear talk that we need more religion in our lives. I assure you, we do not.