Here is a great article that is very well written and worded looking into the apparent need of many to have religious guidance in their lives.  This draws some parallels with the book I am reading now: Why We Believe What We Believe: Uncovering Our Biological Need for Meaning, Spirituality, and Truth.  I find it fascinating that people will do anything to force themselves to accept a fantasy as presented in religion.

criticising[sic] religion was not enough. I needed to understand why religion becomes an integral part of a person's life - and doesn't cease to be so when such beliefs cause the person much pain and guilt, or lead him to commit murder, even to the point of genocide.

No religion accepts us as the person we know ourselves to be. Rather, we are told that we are inadequate, unsatisfactory and helpless. We fear that this is so, and to give us hope we, like Ella, construct a fantasy about how we are superior to those who do not share our views.

On these grounds we feel entitled to force our views on non-believers, and, if they resist, to kill them. I was taught that we Presbyterians were infinitely superior to Catholics and all the rest, while Aboriginals were not even human.

ARTICLE: http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/main.jhtml?xml=/earth/2008/09/30/scigod130.xml