This entire article by Dr. Ehrman is worth a read. Here are a few selections from it.
. . . I’m not opposed to religion and I don’t think that all religion is oppressive—far from it. I also think that people should be free to embrace whatever religious or non-religious views they choose whether they’re Christian, Jewish, Buddhist, Hindu, Muslim, Pagan, agnostic, humanist, or atheist, so long as they don’t use their religious or non-religious views to silence, oppress, or harm others. Even though I’m not opposed to religion, I am opposed to strident ideology and to every kind of fundamentalism.
. . .
Now that I’m not a Christian in any sense, I see that my religious past, especially my fundamentalist past, was oppressive and harmful. I now think that it kept me at that time from being fully human, and it was used as a means of control. As a result, I’m no longer a believer who studies the Bible. I’m a historian who studies the Bible, and I study it because I think it’s so important for understanding our history and culture, and I think that as a scholar of the Bible, I can help other people who are also oppressed by religion. I try to make my research useful to others by making public what scholars have long been saying about the Bible. Most of my popular books that fundamentalists have found so offensive are books in which I simply lay out what scholars, even Christian scholars, have been saying for centuries.
. . .
In my part of the world, in the South, humanists are largely known as negative opponents of all things religious, strident protesters against values that people in my world hold near and dear. So forgive me if I’m being overly obvious, but in my opinion, for humanism to strive and to succeed in these places, it’s not enough to protest. Humanism must make a positive impact on people’s lives and be looked upon, even by outsiders, as a good and healthy phenomenon. Among other things, humanists need to provide social outlets that mirror what believers have in their churches. When someone leaves the womb of the church, they need to have somewhere else to go. They need warm, loving, welcoming, safe communities of like-minded people where they can establish social networks and find fellowship with people who share their world views, their loves, hates, concerns, passions, and obsessions. They need context within which they can discuss the big issues of life, not just politics but also life-and-death issues. They need places where they can celebrate what is good in life and where they can work to overcome what is bad.
Humanist organizations need to become as recognizable as the Baptist church on the corner and the Episcopal church up the street. They need to be seen as the first responders when an earthquake hits Haiti, to be seen as major forces in the fight against poverty, homelessness, malaria, AIDS, and other epidemics. They need to be seen as vibrant and viable alternatives to the religions of the world, which often do so much harm while trying to do good. Whatever else we might say about organized religion, it cannot be denied that it is often the catalyst for much of what is good in the world. But it shouldn’t be the only catalyst, especially since so many people are silenced, oppressed, and harmed by religion. In other words, people must be liberated not only from something but also for something. That, in my opinion, should be the leading goal and objective of every humanist organization.
. . .
http://thehumanist.org/november-december-2011/biblical-scholarship-and-the-right-to-know/