This “stunned appreciation of an ‘otherness’ beyond the reach of language”, for Armstrong, constitutes the heart of every religion. Their liturgies and rituals, their myths and legends that explained creation and helped mankind deal with quotidian misfortune and misery, were all constructed to aid adherents in the path towards this goal. And containing as these faiths all do some variant of the “Golden Rule” – do to others as you would have done to yourself – the steps on this path involved charity and compassion, not the intolerance of fundamentalists and their mirror image, the new God-destroyers.
To read this excellent New Statesman review of Armstrong's book
'The Case for Religion' click on the link
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