The Universe that we know today, was created billions of years ago with an explosion, The Big Bang. Few billion years after, life evolved on one of the planet, the Earth, i.e. our habitat.
As the mankind evolved, it started to wonder about the world around it. The man couldn't understand how there's light for some time and no light for rest of the time. How rain falls and how earthquakes occur. So, man began the universal quest to understand the forces of nature.
Quest about the origin and afterlife.
Quest about Birth and Death and the afterlife.
At the same time, Human was living in the harsh atmosphere of the surrounding Earth. So there was an imminent need to overcome it to survive. The life, itself is creation of fusion among two of its constituents, i.e. male and female. So the surroundings made it imperative on his part to socialise. Concurrently, the change in food habits and advent of agriculture gave impetus to the process. So man began living in groups and those became integral part of his life. (So is the case with many animals, specially those who are vulnerable to surrounding)
Now, in that group, or we may call it a civilisation (though incorrect technically) needed a set of rules so that all can live well within the group. i.e. need of a harmonious way. That created institutions of administration as well as that of 'Religion'.
The religion necessarily was a tool to create (or bring) order to that group of humans, for the greater good. But then arose the problem of the enforceability of the rules.
Then mankind made the greatest conceptual fusion of all times. He fused the Religion with the Non-understood parts of universe together, to give credentials to the theory. Then the rains and thunderstorm became curse of god upon mankind (Mongol). Earth became flat and sun revolving around it (Christianity). All the natural phenomenons were deified, personified and worshipped (Greek Paganism and Hinduism). Most important was the invention ( and I repeat 'invention') of Heaven and Hell.(Universally prevalent).
It was the simplest answer to all those things he couldn't understand. Mankind created the cloak of that imaginary world to cover an extremely vulnerable truth. The truth, that there are some things we do not understand and foresee, and we probably we cannot.
Then began the worst period of Mankind's quest of the Universe. All the rationality that we posses was overshadowed by the foolish conceptions written in some of the religious scripts. Our wisdom and truth was branded as 'Blasphemous' and the pathways of exploring the world were shut completely.
Also the quest of betterment of life was disallowed in the name of preserving the 'true Religion'.
The cloak we wore, turned into an steel frame, which continuously refused to let humans expose the contemporary limitations of human brain and Knowledge.
The Religion didn't stop there either. The extent of Religion to undermine and dwarf the mankind encroached every aspect of human life. It even began to issue orders ,involving massacres and carnages of the groups of other religion or that of the non-believers. t was the same Religion which meant to bring stability and harmony in life.
The Religion had consolidated its hold over Humanity for long time until something fabulous happened in the Europe. Renaissance! It changed the way we look at the World, Universe, Nature and most importantly Humans itself.
Thereafter we began to think and expand our knowledge refuting that cloak of
Religion. Then began the true progress of mankind.
Even today Religion and Religious Scripts are integral part of every aspect of human life in most of the world. Lets analyse it's truth.
Consider the following facts that
a)we are the only (maybe) living species in the known universe, which comprises of Billions of Stars, Planets, Galaxies and trillions of other space objects;
b)life needs extremely vast (practically infinite) set of delicate and complex condition to evolve;
We are the luckiest of all among the planets around us. (It is analogous to you getting the Jacket thrown up in air by Shakira in an open concert! ).
So, life was created on earth mere by a chance or luck. Or perhaps we do not know the actual process that culminated in the birth of life. Religion surely had no role in it. So what the religion has preached so far, is completely absurd and a deliberate lie, which was spread to continue it's hold over the humanity.
I do agree, that there exist some things, by virtue of which Religion has been successful in bringing the order to Human life. Unfortunately the price we paid, was much higher. Also the order, that religions have created, is far from perfect. It is status quoist in almost all religions. And they have brought civilisations and Human quest to a standstill.
So, whatever has happened in the Universe is absolutely by chance and no Earthly or Godly power has done it. So the Ships of Venus 'seen' by Christians as well as the universe in the mouth of Krishna seen by Yashoda (Mata) are eually absurd.
To conclude please try to fuse following thoughts.
An interesting hymn from व्यासोपनिशद,
ॐ पूर्णमदः पूर्णमिदं पूर्णात् पूर्ण मुदच्यते
पूर्णस्य पूर्ण मादाय पुर्णनेमा वशिश्यते.
(Aum, This is complete and That is complete. From Completeness, Completeness arises. Taking Complete out of Complete, what remains is also Complete)
Second one is,
Ideology is the false consciousness.
The Religion is opium to masses
-Karl Marx.
(I know many will disagree to it. Those who do, are welcomed to challenge it.)