I truly get it, I really do see why people turn to faith in order to find their moral compass...

[Kellerfeller]

49. However, if a person is lacking empathy

I generally support them believing in an afterlife.

Let's take a person who is angry and feels they have nothing to live for. If that person has no belief in an afterlife or consequences, there is really nothing to stop him from killing himself and at least trying to take out everyone he is pissed at (or even random folks) along the way.

On the other hand, if he believes in eternal damnation, then he might think twice. If fear of a higher power stops even a small portion of these people, then it is a good thing.

I think people have every right to take themselves out of this world but I'd like to minimize the number of other people they take out.

The counter argument is that religion motivates some people to kill others. On a global scale, that is certainly true. Granted, I believe that if they didn't have religion to blame it on, many of these wars would still be happening with a different excuse. However, if we just look within America we have very few people killing in the name of religion but far too many taking out a bunch of people just because they are pissed.