Christianity. Or rather Jesus-ism. (Big big difference.) I didn't pick that, though, he picked me. I was raised an agnostic. (My mother is an atheist; but I was fairly sure she doesn't know whether God exists any more than I know it, or anyone else, so I am an agnostic, as was my father. An agnostic Christian is not a contradiction in terms, btw; I do not know, I merely believe sometimes, and sometimes I merely hope, but it doesn't really make any difference to me if Christ exists in the external world; he exists in my internal one since turning up there a few years ago, and I'd be satisfied with that. Though of course it would be nice if he turns out to really still be alive. And has serious influence
Though I daresay it's no coincidence that I'm a socially progressive type who believes in tolerance, peace, love, and social justice -- as ideals, mind; I know perfectly well what the world is like. And that's Jesus's prgram too, pretty much. --To have the faintest idea what Jesus said you have to read the very skimpy bits where he's quoted, and sort out what's obviously somebody else's agenda inserted. And for God's sake you must ignore the nutjob fringe right-wing fundy types, who seem to have never read a word Jesus supposedly said, and instead cobbled together a religion out of the bits of the Jewish scriptures that almost all Jews decided a thousand years ago couldn't/should not be taken literally under any circumstances and certainly were not written by God in any case; which religion would have Jesus rolling in his grave (if he stayed there).
But I came to it through experiences that startled subtly but, when I persisted for decades in showing no sign of getting hints, eventually grabbed me by the collar and screamed in my face. That did it eventually, though I resisted mightily, being a skeptic by nature and by trade, as a science journalist.
I doubt I would have picked any religion, otherwise; I was pretty anti-religion.
Oh, and there is stuff to feel guilty about. Harming the innocent and powerless being a prime example. Hitler should have felt guilty as heck about the Holocaust. Fathers who rape their little girls instead of protecting them are deficient in guilt. I spoke to one and he felt no guilt at all about molesting his 4-year-old daughter when she came to his bed one night scared of a thunderstorm; so in place of internal restraints of harmful behavior, I had to call the police on him. I would rather he felt guilty at the idea and thus not proceeded to actually do what he wanted; it would have saved a lot of people a world of pain, and his daughter a part of her psyche that will never be whole again.
Homosexuality? No guilt necessary, because it's not a choice. Ditto truly victimless crimes that are crimes only because the law so dictates.
But sociopaths could really do with some guilt. Cut down on child molestation, rape, senseless violence, starting random wars on a whim; all good as far as I'm concerned, and a pity the guilt is in absentia.
