My take on Religion

To me, the concept that unifies (and at the same time, some might argue, makes meaningless) all religions is this:

The definition of god (or any other higher consciousness/power that we can not perceive) is that which has the ability to influence what we perceive to be random.

That solves the problem of free will, intelligent design vs. evolution, ... et cetera. And it doesn't require anything complicated like an all-powerful God, yet still lets you believe one exists, if you want to. You can think you're part of this consciousness if you believe in free will, or not part of it if you believe we're all just "moist robots", reacting to stimuli as it comes in. Or you can believe in the Mischievous Pixie Queen. It doesn't matter, because it's all the same: that which has the power to influence perceived randomness.

Maybe you think your God has other super-cool powers, like causing huge floods and turning water into wine. That stuff might have just been made up to make your God sound cooler than the other competing Gods... but it still doesn't matter, because nothing within the realm of physical possibility is off-limits! If all that water really turned into wine due to some fluke of quantum physics, maybe the guy who did it was just really in touch with his consciousness and could influence randomness at his whim. Either that, or they lied in that precious book of yours. Pick one.

Now that everyone's happy, let's move on to real world issues that affect people, instead of arguing over meaningless concepts. I would appreciate that.

So, to summarize: God == Consciousness == Influence of Randomness. Problem solved.