Perhaps I have been a little too generous with my use of the term "freethinker". For the freethinker I am thinking of largely rejects the noble either/or: he largely rejects reason. He is only a freethinker in the sense that his thinking frees him from either/or thinking, not in the sense that his thought is original and unhindered. He survives life by rejecting either/or, while the fundamentalist seeks refuge in a warped either/or world.
As I have said, ego-cycles are not confined to the individual; there are no ends in Nature. Causes have effects, and seeds eventually bear fruit. If the eventual fruition is not in the individual, then it is in others within the individual's sphere of influence - which is unbounded. Cause and effect ensures that the easy-going religionist, the freethinker, tolerant of a broad variety of scriptural interpretations, is the alter-ego of the killer - the violent and hate-ridden fundamentalist. Hence the killer is not a different person to the pacifist; he is one and the same, though under a temporary guise.