Do you think society would be better off if more people were religious ? i need one paragraph or two. why is the influence of churches ?

If you Googled the question constituting the title of this article—or minor variants of it—as the first author of this article did on Christmas Day of 2013, you’d end up with more than 650,000 hits. This high number attests to the keen public interest generated by this age-old question. Indeed, few topics have generated more impassioned discussion among religious believers and skeptics alike. For example, in 2007, the British organization Intelligence-Squared hosted a lively debate on the proposition that “We’d be better off without religion,” with proponents of the motion—Richard Dawkins, A.C. Grayling, and Christopher Hitchens—squaring off against the opponents Julia Neuberger, Professor Roger Scruton, and Nigel Spivey. Over the past decade, a seemingly never-ending parade of books and articles have tackled “the question,” as we dub it, from various angles; entering the phrase “better off without religion” into an Amazon.com book search yields over 130 results.

The answer would be no. people are already trying to force their religion on others as it is and say another religion is wrong and theirs  is right.the influence of churches throughout history has been very great because people wanted to believe in something. The great persecution was an example of how people try to force others to believe what they believe because if a person doesn't believe the same as you apparently they are wrongi am not really sure how to explain this but i hope this is somewhat helpful...if you need more let me know

:what is edwards's purpose for giving this sermon? which elements likely make the argument effective for a puritan audience?