Religion, hell and hope!

I'm not a religious individual but this article I recently read on Time Magazine made me feel at ease about my feelings and opinions about this heaven and hell that allegedly exists for our immortal souls.  Growing up as a catholic and in a society predominantly christian, despite having your own personal opinions about religion, the people around me, media and society instilled this idea and premise in my head that those that do good deeds go to heaven and those that sin go to hell. In other words, if you're a believer of God and follow his teachings you go to heaven.  If you violate his laws (and not confess right after) and don't go to church you go to hell.  As an individual that questions everything, I always felt guilty and like a sinner for not following my parent's religious beliefs.  Now, I'm glad I decided to question what society and my priest preached.

Jon Meacham, the author or this article "Is Hell Dead?" makes a valid point. In this article about pastor Rob Bell, where Rob questions where dead babies go if they weren't given a chance to make their own opinions about God and religion? Do they go to heaven by default? This idea about the existence of hell is a bit challenging for me to comprehend. Also, why would Jesus die for our sins and then allow those that sin go to "hell"?  If he died for our sins, shouldn't we all go to heaven no matter what?  Understandings like these are the ones that help me validate my belief about how religion is used as a tool to control groups of people by providing a celestial  and eternal world for those that follow the teachings of God and also instill fear to those committing sins by creating this imaginary, eternally, painful and dreadful world called Hell.

Now, you might be asking why priests (and also government) would need to control people at all?  In my opinion, religion was first an ancient form of government that helped groups of people with some direction in life and some form of unity. Later on, in my opinion, religions and churches, and it's hard to admit this, were just a business. It was a well funded system demanded by people that continued to need direction and hope! Today, in a era dominated by science and a time when more and more people are questioning religion and God, religion itself is predominantly used as a scare tactic. It's not just hell that's used as a scare tactic. Religion itself encompasses this dichotomous idea that there's only good and evil. Those that side with the religion will live a happy, heavenly life after death and those that sin would face fire and demons for eternal life. Religion doesn't provide a third option.

Despite being so critical and harsh on religion I believe religion provides many positives.  For one, having a religion that believes in a higher power and a God with unimaginable powers, many people are able to attain hope and faith from this higher power and rely on this faith to continue to their lives through tough times.  If it wasn't for religion, our only views and understandings about our future would be based on our personal facts and reality and not these preexisting system of religion that allows us to believe beyond what we see.  Faith, hope and ambiguity from God allows us to remain optimistic about the future. Mystery and uncertainty allows us to continue living with some hope of prosperity despite all the chaos and evil on Earth.  Heaven and hell might not exist as described by pastors and priests interpret the bible, but religion itself might just have something we all need to continue our lives. Hope and faith.