There is no question that faith has affected our world greatly: it has served to play a guide to human morals, to instill kindness in the people and to inspire fear in those evil. But in our modern society, could 'unquestioning faith' be something terrifying or vile? Vonnegut certainly thinks so.
I think what Vonnegut is referring to is 'blind faith'. And I have to agree with Vonnegut: There has to be a balance to how much faith you put into the supernatural. On the other side of the merits of faith, we have many wars as a result, murders, and crimes too. People fighting to the death for what they believe in. And I certainly hope that these people who die for what they believe in, actually think about what they believe rather than following it blindly.
In my opinion, Religion is something that is inherited. Passed down from father to son, from mother to daughter. And I think that this causes a lot of havoc. A child should never have ideals fed to them. They must explore the world for themselves, they must see every explanation there is to offer and only then decide what to believe in: else they're belief will be based on bias, (even if true!). It is something that a child should come to understand themselves, and because in our world, this principle is neglected, we have 'blind religion'.
A child exposed to this inheritance, will have no other principles to compare with and so will usually unquestioningly follow what they have learned for it is all that they have grown up with. I think this is how Vonnegut views unquestioning faith as something terrible. Absolute faith is dangerous.
It is quite clear to me that Vonnegut is an existentialist writer: his novel Slaughterhouse Five seems to calmly tell us from the mouths of the Tralfamadorians, who see the world as a plain course of events, that don't matter enough to save. The quote written above enforces his existentialism by pointing out his ridicule of absolute faith.
-Daniel
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