I do believe Jesus the carpenter existed without a doubt and perhaps his adventures was a great story to be told to the younger generation to give hope!
What message of hope is there with Jesus, the way I see it the tale is this:
Once upon a time a really nice man existed who wanted equality for all.
At 30 odd years old he pissed off the establishment so much that he was nailed to a cross until dead.
But then he magically cam back to life (uhh yeah right, that's believable) the end.
Now correct me if I'm wrong but if you tell that tale to a young kid then that kid will probably think "Holy carp! I don't want to be nailed to a cross"
Wearing a cross around your neck is akin to a JFK fan wearing a sniper rifle on a pendant. But churches take it even further, their image of christ is his actuall body hanging on the cross and you can see the nails through the wrists and a gaping wound on his side. Often in true technicolor, I've seen some statues where the artist has gone to great lengths to make the blood look wet using a high gloss varnish atop the dark red paint, gory stuff!
The message is: Let that be a reminder to you young man... you start acting all hippy like and that could be YOU nailed to that cross, just pay your tithes and keep yourself to yourself. Oh and cut your damned hair you hippy!
This whole Jesus thing is clearly a citizen control tool, CLEARLY!
Religions themselves are just cults, each one in the evolutionary game of cult survival.
Fuck religion, it does not care for you, it will gladly murder you for the survival of the cult, so I say it again... fuck it, it's time humanity left the dark ages, the stars await us....