Religion the root of all evil

Oxford Professor, Richard Dawkins, has produced a two-part television program in which he attempts to demonstrate that religion is the root of all evil. This is an old argument and I haven't seen the series but just a few observations on the basic argument itself:

1. The use of the term "evil" in a naturalistic, Darwinian, argument seems out of place. If a dragonfly kills and eats a mosquito is the dragonfly evil? If a weasel kills a whole hen house full of chickens and leaves them to die in their own blood is the weasel evil? If a lion kills and eats a man is the lion evil? If a man kills another man is the man evil? At what point in the food chain does killing become evil? What place do moral judgments have in a purely naturalistic world? Is the evolutionary process of struggle and survival a moral process? Does Dawkins reserve the moral argument for homo sapiens alone? What dramatic change has taken place in the history of evolution that suddenly the whole story has taken on deeply moral tones? Is it possible that even the evolutionists cannot live with the logic of a purely naturalistic world? If humans are simply fancy containers for genes, as Dawkins believes, then how can any moral judgments be made against anyone?

2. The phrase "religion is the root of all evil" can be defended using the same methodology that Dawkins uses by substituting for the word "religion" any ideology, culture, or subculture that you wish to insert, including science. It would not be difficult to insert "atheism" in the place of religion and come up with a compelling argument in support of the case. The most "successful" application of Marxist ideology has been communism. With its intention to eliminate all forms of religion and to eliminate all of its ideological opponents this form of atheism has been responsible for the deaths of between 85 and 100 million people worldwide. What Dawkins fails to see is that it is people (theologically speaking, sin) that are the root of all evil, if it is possible to believe in evil at all in a naturalistic universe. Evil people will use any tool to promote their evil including religion, science, marxism, etc.

3. I can take the phrase "religion is the root of all evil" and test its veracity in terms of my own life. I can certainly say that I have committed evils in my live, and continue to do so. As a Christian I have been continually confronted by my own evil through my reading of the Bible. The Sermon on the Mount alone provides a powerful counterforce against the inclinations of the human heart. In my own case religion has acted as a restraint on evil and has presented a challenge to me to live in love, mercy, and forgiveness, even towards those that I might be inclined to view as my enemies. Have I ever used my religion as an excuse to do evil? Yes. But this does not make religion the root of my evil. It only shows how the human heart is inclined to take even the good and use it for evil. Although religion might present me with yet another tool with which to do harm it is also the most powerful tool I have for confronting and overcoming the evil that is in me. Beyond that it is a wellspring of grace and mercy and forgiveness that gives me the freedom to pursue the life of the gospel.