When I was a boy, I had very few possessions, but my father worked for a telephone company. He gave me an outdated dial phone the company had discarded. It was not connected to anything, but I took great joy in pretending it worked. I would make calls and pretend people were phoning me. One day my brother threw it on the floor.
“I’m tired of hearing you pretend you can talk to people. The phone doesn’t work you know. There’s no one there, you’re talking to yourself!”
“I know,” I replied, “but I enjoy pretending. Why couldn’t you just let me be. I wasn’t doing any harm.”
My point is that imagination can serve a purpose and help a person cope with difficulties in their life. Believing that there is a purpose, makes sense of our struggles and disappointments. Faith can be comforting and offer a feeling of security in uncertain times. It is not my desire to damage something a person values in order to justify my own present views; besides viewpoints can change. Mine included.