Will the religions of today eventually die out?

[fujiyama]

I was wondering what you all think of today's religions and cults compared to those of the past, such as the gods of ancient Greece.

How many more centuries do you predict today's religions will survive? Already in Europe we see an ever decreasing church going population. Many in European countries openly consider themselves atheist.

Even here in the US, while the present government is increasingly theocratic, I believe many are starting to think less of religion.

Though we hear much of religious conflicts, many of these are proxy battles for other causes such as territory, cultural history, etc. As more people embrace modern science, religion inevitably will be seen more and more outdated.

Am I mistaken?

[DenverDem]

1. Mainstream Christianity is out of touch with reality.

Thus it is losing ground with people who think.

Buddhism is gaining ground.

Pre-Roman Christianity could pick up steam, but it is infinitesmally small and up against a couple of millennia of socialized mindshare.

[Az]

3. Maybe not

It has an effective and active propogation method. It has dealt with the opposition of knowledge in the past and dealt it a terrible blow. Meanwhile any system that advocates tolerance and acceptance has no means of propogating itself beyond educating people to the reality that there is a multiplicity of views in the world.

[papau]

11. "opposition of knowledge" - sigh - cute, AZ - I don't think you have

had the joy of discussions with Jesuits.

But as always - I liked your post - brought a smile -

although I obviously do not agree with your theme.

:toast:

:-)

[Az]

27. Actually

I have. I do not consider Christianity to be one monolithic entity. It has branched out into a multiplicity of systems. The Jesuits and several others do back their teachings with a great deal of learning. But you will find that propogation does not favor the practices that may wind up challenging itself.

A social environment can support a fairly diverse collection of belief systems. Each with their own balance of defenses and methods. Some are prolific spreaders like the more experential pentecosts of late. Others have a very low means of spreading but a very consistant population such as the Amish.

Simply observe society. Realize that whether god exists or not the teaching that advocate his/her/its existance are transferred from one human to another. It is this transference that gives rise to the variety of belief systems. The efficiency at which they spread determines the dominant religious beliefs. The various tactics they adopt become the evolutionary steps they take in determining the outcome of the battle for claiming territory.

[papau]

33. Marketing? - and Distribution -indeed that is a way to view religion

perhaps even a useful way.

I concur with your post as it uses that point of view

- but for me that is not the way one comes to God - or religion

but having been treasurer of some very poor religious operations, I can see how I would have loved to have you as an advisor in those days!

[Az]

38. More biology than marketting

Specifically evolution. The human psyche is the environment in which beliefs struggle for survival. That includes all the experential aspects that comes with subjective realization of self.

Simply put, those religions or philosophies that do not find some connection to our basic experience of life do not get picked up by the mind. Thus they die out. Over time those concepts that both answer questions and lead to an increased propogation of the belief are the ones that survive. All manner of benefit comes from this. Strong society. Interconnected community. Anything that lends strength to the group can be incorporated into the belief.

Thus through this methodology we can discern wisdon within any of the surviving world religions today. But along with the wisdom comes many other attachments like junk DNA hooking a ride along with the productive genes within the system. The trouble becomes sifting through the systems and discerning the valuable and the junk.

Thus you can have a belief system that on the one hand has come up with a positive social motiffe such as treat others as you would have them treat you alongside teaching people to stone children for disrespecting their elders. The religions continue to try to adapt to current social expectation while trying to keep their own particular instruction set intact. Thus the frequent schisms and fractures occurring in the structures.

[papau]

41. I miss discussions like this!

So, evolution of the human psyche implies only those religions or philosophies that find some connection to our basic experience of life get picked up by the mind - making religion a survival characteristic?

I do not see why, but then I have thought about for all of 5 minutes! :-)

Granted that social groupings imply "strong society and Interconnected community" and such would help survival of the group - and religion can be such a glue - but is it necessary? - how do you prove it is necessary?.

Indeed the evidence lends more force to tribe and village as the source of "community" - not religion. Indeed any group for whom one posits a religion, one would posit a sub group of folks that do not believe - yet they stay with the group - lest they die out.

The next piece of logic therefore appears to be quite a stretch - the idea that a evolution screen or thought process or point of view helps one to discern wisdom within a religion, and indeed one needs only then to reject the other attachments - "junk" - so as to have religious motif that is absent junk.

The basic concept of a religion is that it is unchanging - the only "adaption" is to conform to social rules where those rules do not affect the unchanging core of the religious belief.

Again I do not see your evolution of religion concept as viable given the information I am aware of in the historical record. But I never said I knew even a small part of anything! - :-)

To keep to the truth that one feels in ones religion is rephrased by you as simply keeping "their particular instruction set intact" - WOW - is that an mis-characterization - IMHO of course.

But as always AZ, I do like your posts!

:-)

[Az]

52. Religion is the rider on society

It has entwined itself deep within our society but it is the addintion. Our biological natures drive us together into social groups. Our minds create the enviroment in which necissary ideas and extraneaou ideas vie for existance. That which finds a means of gaining a foot hold may stick around. Thus like evolution functional ideas survive based on their ability to do so.

The entirety of a persons experience becomes the filter through which they know the world. Religions having survived 1000s of years of adaption make their way into a persons belief by their environment. Suffice to say without exposure to a complex belief set you are unlikely to come upon fully formed on your own. Thus children of Christians typically become Christian. Children of Jews Typically become Jews. As Richard Dawkins suggested, "Out of all of the sects in the world, we notice an uncanny coincidence: the overwhelming majority just happen to choose the one that their parents belong to". Thus we see the means of transmission for the majority of beliefs is via their parents during early development.

Some struggle to form their own synthesis of their experiences combined with what they learned as children. These become the individuals that take part in their own journey of discovery.

It takes a tremendous emotional event to shake a persons belief structure. We are emotional creatures at heart (actually at brain but such is poetic metaphore) and we associate vie those emotions. What we learn early in life is bonded closely to our emotions. It becomes the filter through which we judge what has merrit to our reality or not. Later we learn to depend to varying degrees on tools such as logic and reason. But these are depended on only as much as our emotional connection to them allows.

Thus when presented with new information our mind weighs the matter in comparison to the balance of our experiences. It applies whatever tools it has developed for determining validity of ideas. If the new information does not emotionally outweigh our current balance of beliefs it is discarded or set aside for later consideration.

Thus an argument between a believer and a skeptic can have the skeptic destroying every aspect of the believers position and still the believer will not be convinced. The arguments simply do not outweigh their experience. The mind cannot unseat a belief unless it is ousted by a greater emotional connection.

Thus it is that we find peoples beliefs changing when they experience deeply personal junctions in their life. The loss of a loved one. A personal set back. Something that jars the very way they see the world about them. It is at this juncture that new balances are made. It is at this point faith is lost or found. Depending on the individuals surrounding them at the time and the concepts they have been exposed to and set aside they may find a new route or after some turmoil find themself back within the fold they came from.

We do not easily let go of belief.

[papau]

53. We do not easily let go of belief-indeed Science truth changes as new folk

replace the prior generation of scientists (by 1960 plate technology was solid science - but it was still being proven 20 years later - it had to wait for the old generation to retire!).

So we have some agreement here!

BUT - what you are saying is that the "better" mind leads to survival - and given our 3 inch height 5 million years ago - and lack of existence prior - I am not sure how much of a survival advantage our mind actually provides. And if it abstract thinking is favored, why did and do nerds like myself get laid much less than the local football hero?

It is temping to assign a value in the survival game to religion - and indeed the grouping for defense idea is true - I just do not see the religious connection.

Ideas survive was a statement I heard in school 40 years ago - it was a battle of ideas where evolution principles meant the best idea survived - I did not buy it then - and have not changed my opinion - we may have to agree to disagree!

However I do agree with your comment that "the entirety of a persons experience becomes the filter through which they know the world."

Where we part is the need for a past filter to modify - the Greeks seem to have "invented" concepts around 500 BC - what was the filter that existed then that was missing a 1000 years earlier?

I agree we are in an add value world - since it is near impossible to come to the table without exposure to a complex belief set - in religion as well in other areas - all a gift from our parents. And I agree we all take part in our own journey of discovery, where testing the parents gift of a filter is perhaps not known to those with the "conservative" gene.

I find that most liberals I meet had a rebellion against the parents moment that usually lasted a few years - and that the filter was tested. Indeed most end up the same as the parents - but that does not mean the filter was not tested.

And I agree we compare new information to our old information, but the set aside or discard is based on logic - even for believers -even if the skeptic is convinced that he has destroyed "every aspect of the believers position ". It is not just a greater emotional connection - although the skeptic may fall back on that excuse if he finds he has not convinced the believer.

Questioning ones belief set is indeed hard work - thus the weekly meetings of believers as the remember the topic!

And changes to belief and faith can occur at any moment - although I grant you emotional "jars" are times when this may be more likely to occur.

And I end as we began - saying that I agree with your statement that skeptic and believer do not easily let go of their opinion/belief.

[Az]

54. Perhaps you are using Personal Philosophy instead of religion

I am talking about complex religious belief systems. Stories and legends that suvive in conjunction with moral and ethical teachings. If you had not heard these stories as a method of indoctrination you would not come up with them on your own. If stranded on a desert island you would not invent the story of the Crucifixion as an example. You needed to be taught this story.

Now as to evolution and so called better minds. There is no judgement associated with the qualitative measure in the eyes of evolution. That which survives is simply that which survives. The environment can create an entire range of criteria that determine what survives.

From a societal measure the religions that have adopted the proven forms of social manipulation are the ones that tend to survive. All we know from the survival of any given religion is that its teachings contain some methodology that has seen it through the ages and managed to propogate itself till now. Those that fail to build strong societies with an effective means of propogating go the way of the Shakers and Moists. They fade from memory. With no effective means of perpetuating their complex teachings their stories are lost to all but historians.

Now an individual may create their own personal set of philosophies from the wash of teachings they have been met with. It may even exists as a combination of a number of religious teachings. Personal Philosophies are a potential new variation of a religion and depending on how forceful the individual may be their concepts may take root in other minds thus setting a new branch or path on its way.

The commoness of diverse societies is a hallmark of our Post Modern culture. In the majority of history society has been more monolithic within various nations. The nation, culture, and religion were typically tied together as one identity. Now we have massively diverse societies which are spawning new religions and belief sets at an ever increasing rate.

The social forces are in disarray as seen by the floundering of the forces behind the Post Modern adaption of diverse society vs the desire by factions to return to the certainty as represented by orthodox absolute belief systems. The battle between the disorganized left and the organized right.

[papau]

58. Folks do not know the oral /written history without being told or reading?

Seems a point we can agree on. But Personal Philosophy (defined by you as moral and ethical teachings) is not "religion without knowing the history, stories, and "legends" of the past".

"Invent the story of the Crucifixion" implies that we do not know that the Romans used Crucifixion, and the Jews did not, and that a reasonable estimate would be 10,000 Jews died by Crucifixion during the lifetime of Jesus. By using the term "story" you seem to fall back on the old canard of "all early Christians and Romans lied about Jesus" - so to recall history is to recall a "story". I grant you that history as handed down over the centuries can differ from what really happened - but we have done enough science here to know that it usually amazingly accurate - even oral history only over the centuries. There is no proof - heck no suggestion except the fact some had no faith and did not believe the resurrection was possible - that the Crucifixion - leaving aside the resurrection -is just a story - indeed if just a story why include such detail? And indeed Crucifixion was so common in those days that having 2 others die that day seemed normal to the average person listening at that time. Can we limit the discussion to religion - belief/faith that there is a God - without wandering into the never-never land of choosing to call the early Christians all liars? It seems pointless to continue if the game is to deny history based on a "how do we know they were telling the truth" concept that lacks even reasonable indications of lying.

We agree evolution is simply that which survives and that the environment can create winners - species wipe outs - even those that take 100 million years as in some dinosaur records - or after the comet hit in Mexico - are proof of this.

But to say religions survive because they are proven forms of social manipulation is to talk in circles. Religions are social and change behavior (manipulation if you like) and - like family structure - affect survival. Indeed the tribes that survives in North America 10,000 years ago are the ones that choose a family structure that valued women - their religious belief or lack thereof is unknown so correlation with religion can not be tested. But we do know of many religions that put a low value on women - and the religion survives. I accept family structure and social attitudes as survival indicators - but where in the world did we get data on religion as a survival indicator - and more important - it appears to be only an assertion that evolution favors religious motivation of the group over non-religious motivational techniques.

I think the "new religion concept" where we rename religious feelings as Personal Philosophies with "concepts" is interesting - but the discussion was on believers versus skeptics. If we change the topic now our exchange will become a book!

Your last paragraphs I totally agree with - I have always said that the village - city state - valley state - etc. - is where one gets ones identity. Again you then leave the believe versus skeptic discussion to go into "new religions and belief sets" as if the existence of multiple religions proves belief in religion is to allow social manipulation and to be ruled by that which is not logical. Well we agree faith and belief are not logical. :-)

But is the rejection of a belief in God a fear of God, a fear of not being in control in the face of questions even logical folks agree can not be answered by logic. The religion of Science - the "give us time and all questions will be answered without reference to a God" faith, and the religion of atheism - the "I just know there is no God and do not have to prove it because it is proving a negative and besides the unanswered questions do not bother me because I do not need to know or I do not need certainty" religion are interesting responses to this life.

The certainty as represented by "orthodox absolute belief systems" (read Jew/Christian, etc.) is certainty that you do not know squat and that you put yourself in the hands of God.

I guess we all deal with this life in different ways.

peace

:-)

[Az]

61. The claim

is not that religion forms from a vacuum or a false story. Rather the nature of its origin is indeterminible based on how one learns about it in its normal means of propogation. Thus Jesus may have actually existed. The Amish interpretation may in fact be the correct one. Their belief structure may have somehow survived intact all these years. But we cannot distinguish it from the other adapted beliefs systems that have modified and evolved over the years. Or perhaps the only true interpretation as intended by the god has long since died out because its propogation method could not overcome another religions and it died out in a clash with it.

The point is that we cannot determine whether any particular religious belief is more valid than another. We can look into them and determine what it is that allowed them to survive. We can see the tactics that brought them to where they are. We can try to learn from them what they have picked up along the way. But we cannot know if they are the truth.

The use of the word evolution in the context of this conversation is focused on the evolution of the religions themselves. Religions posess all the properties needed to evolve.

They replicate themselves with errors. What one person teaches may be interpretted differently thus the religion can change.

The struggle over resources. Religions strive to be the only belief held by a mind. They require minds to exist within and can be driven out by another belief.

Change over time combined with a struggle for resources is the hallmark of evolution. Thus over time those religions that survive manage to replicate.

A religion which promotes a fractious society is less likely to be passed on to another society. A religion which promotes a strong society is more likely to be adopted by members of another. Thus we see the spread of religion along national lines throughout history. When a nation came to another they brought their religion with them and tried to implement it when it arrived. If not as a conqueror then as a missionary.

Modern society has brought new factors in that are particularly dangerous to older established religions. The idea of a diverse culture is a direct threat to these religions. New religions rising daily and poaching in their territory. Exposure to new ideas giving rise to new fusions of philosophies. The changes are coming faster than the established beliefs can adapt to. Thus we see social turmoil and stress along the lines of those adhering to the older religions and those embracing the changes or even discarding the religions altogether.

The rise of the nonchurched believer is just such a threat to the old religions. A person raised within the religion breaking free and forming their own personal set of beliefs fused from new societal ideas and the religious teaching of their youth. This represents a huge threat as they are close enough that they may influence others in the sect to leaving the main body of the religion and strike out on their own.

Thus we see many religions adopting a hard line stance in an attempt to keep these people in the fold. Some sects use extreme pressure from the family. Paternal figures demanding that children stay within the sect. Others use the threat of banishment or shunning to keep individuals close to the belief.

But still the new beliefs form. Some even discard their belief system entirely. It is a time of struggle for religions these days. Never before has there been as great a threat to religion than now. All manner of pressures are arrayed agains them. They cannot keep up with the changes and thus try to exert whatever pressure on society they can. Legal battles ensue as they try to exert control in the old halls of power they once ruled. Education is assaulted in an attempt to silence the source of these new ideas. Science is railed against as tampering with things it should not due to its tendency to undermine claims of particular beliefs.

[Snow]

18. Your last sentence makes sense to me,

and is the way you'd expect the world to wag. So how is it the Society of Friends has lasted 350+ years? Very odd. No doctrine, even. It truly goes against intuition. Granted, they (okay, we, I'm one too) have never been numerous, but one of the founders was sort of friends with Oliver Cromwell, for pete's sake. That's a long time ago.

[Az]

23. Evolution

Does not always select the forms you would expect. Sometimes laws of nature support some structures better. There is an underlying truth to the universe and our human nature. Sometimes various social structures find a vein within these truths that lend them duration beyond the simple tactical advantages of others.

[papau]

44. And sometimes Evolution is just not the explanation!

sigh....

maybe like QM being unable to explain gravity, evolution does not explain religion? Now there is a thought!!!!???

:-)

[starroute]

51. Cargo cults

Back in the 50's, people used to laugh at all the ignorant New Guineans or Pacific islanders who had started a cult of building replica airplanes after World War II, in the hope that it would bring them the materials goods and benefits of Western Civilization.

The funny thing is, it turns out that the groups who did that have adapted far more smoothly to the actual onslaught of Western culture than the groups who held to their more traditional belief systems.

In a somewhat similar way, it's been suggested that fundamentalist religion has the greatest appeal to people who are in the process of leaving their rural and small-town roots and being thrust into the fast-paced and impersonal context of modern society.

In both cases, religion is helping people adapt to change. Apocalyptic religion, in particular, may be a way of easing people through radical disruptions in their own lives. It provides a mirror for what is happening to them. It tells them: "Change is not anything to fear. You can leave behind everything you know, down to the clothes on your back, and you will be far better off as a result."

Science can only tell us about where we are and where we've been. But science fiction and fantasy and myth can tell us about where we're going -- and about how to behave when we get there.

[papau]

60. Very True

:-)

[Anaxamander]

2. I personally don't think much of xtianity..

maybe because I wasn't raised to believe in it, so I don't understand people's fixation on Jesus when there are many others who also suffered for their beliefs. Socrates, for example.

[felonious thunk]

4. All will

All religions will eventually die out. They may be replaced with new religions, or none at all, but all religions will die out. It is the nature of things, new ideas will take hold, old fears will die out. Religions have a lot of staying power, so it may well take a long time, but it will happen.

[Burma Jones]

5. One day, soon I believe, we will know how to keep our

Consciousness alive forever (if you have the cash), whether through nanobots behaving like the cells in your body or continuous cloning or robotics. When that happens, Religion will not really change. I think that the economic basis for religion will remain the same since not everyone will have access to life extension. Furthermore, people need religion because so many are miserable here and have to have the belief that they will be rewarded for their suffering

[Bridget Burke]

31. Great, so the immortals will be Gods....

And those who do not have access to life extension will be their slaves.

Roger Zelazny used this theme in "Lord of Light".

[Burma Jones]

43. Not so different than what we're experiencing now anyway.

Only Bill Gates will live forever.........

[TXlib]

6. If the level of non-biological memory archiving had been present

in ancient greece and rome that is around today, we'd still have a serious cult of Zeus, etc., to contend with.

With the advent of the printing press and mass literacy, and now other forms of media, there will be much more continuity to civilisation.

Barring extreme major catastophes, I think the world's main religions will persist in much their present form for about as long as mankind exists.

[papau]

13. I agree - and for the record, Zeus continues in Northern Pak, and Afghan

tribes (small areas/small tribes - but it does continue).

And how one worships God does not seem a problem to me.

[TXlib]

17. Really? How interesting!

Do any of the other "dead" religions have an appreciable following today?

Anybody worship Ares, or Athena, or any of the others in the Greek panthenon?

What about Zoroastrianism?

[Snow]

19. Zoroastrianism is alive and actually fairly healthy,

in southern afghanistan & some other nearby areas.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

22. The Zoroastrians are also alive and well in India

where they are called Parsees.

Well-known classical music conductor Zubin Mehta comes from a Parsee family in India, although I don't know if he still practices the religion.

[blindpig]

39. fertility "cult"

I recall reading in T.E. Lawerences Seven Pillars of Wisdom that an ancient fertility religion(Istar,Diana?) was still extant in Palestine in the early 20th century.
I often call upon Greek & Teutonic deities.

[LeahMira]

47. The same stories, retold over and over.

I recall reading in T.E. Lawerences Seven Pillars of Wisdom that an ancient fertility religion(Istar,Diana?) was
still extant in Palestine in the early 20th century.

If you read mythology you find that cultures borrow and share their gods, modifying their roles slightly and changing their names. For instance, the Egyptian Set came to Christianity as Satan.

To the extent that any religion speaks to human experience and can change to meet new challenges, it will be successful.
I think the current fundamentalist phenomenon will play itself out fairly quickly. It seems quite rigid and offers nothing of permanent value to the believer.

[blindpig]

49. indeed

I suspect polytheism is the best hope for religion in a civil society. The ancients were pretty much live and let live concerning religion, excluding the Roman cult of the emperor, which was mostly, but not entirely, a political thing.

[La Lioness Priyanka]

7. not hinduism

its been around a long while...its a life style so i think its unlikely it will just disappear

[burythehatchet]

10. hi

:hi:

how's work today?

[La Lioness Priyanka]

21. could be better...:)

whats up with you?

[burythehatchet]

24. Monday blues

spent the weekend in the park with my little guy Justin (5 y.o.). Really did't want to be at work today. Would rather be flying a kite. Instead just hijacking threads

:)

[oneighty]

8. Interesting take on that question.

In a book, JitterbugPerfume, by Tom Robbins.

It is a very funny story wherein the God Pan is a very real God. Pan is fading away due to lack of interest (nobody believes in him anymore). A few people decide to take Pan to America where the Native Americans may believe in him. Resurrect him perhaps.

Pan stinks so bad that a perfume is designed to cover his ripeness.

Thus Jitterbug Perfume. You must read it.

Book recommended by JitterbugPerfume.

180

[Kamika]

9. everything dies.. that's a fact

maybe everything that dies, some day comes back

[Atlant]

12. All of them (at least the theistic ones). (NT)

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

14. This one won't

http://www.democraticunderground.com/discuss/duboard.php?az=view_all&address=105x817553

[Robb]

16. Indeed

...the First Reformed Church of Volume is the fastest growing religion among groups that oppose clowns.

It's true. :D

[leftofthedial]

15. all things must pass

imagine

[Snow]

20. I thnk a charismatic, saintly leader can do much for a religion

and these days we hear about someone in a far corner of the world that would never have had much of an audience not so long ago. I'm thinking particularly of the dalai lama.

[AndyTiedye]

29. if they don't kill off humanity first

The fundie xtians really seem obsessed with the end of the world --
so much so that they may try to make it happen.
Unfortunately, they have control of enough nukes to do a pretty good approximation of it.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

25. The impulse to ponder the imponderable does not die

Seventy years of official atheism didn't kill religion in Russia. People would be secret believers and then "come out of the closet" after retirement when no one could retaliate against them. Intourist guides used to point out the preponderance of gray heads in churches and predict that religion would die out in another generation. They began making this prediction in the 1920s.

The campaign to eradicate religion failed because the government thought it just had to prove that the world wasn't created in 7 days, and then everyone would say, "Oh, I get it," and become good little atheists.

Not being believers themselves, they didn't realize that religion is experiential, not logical. It's sort of like falling in love. There is no logical reason why Person A should become the center of your emotional universe instead of Person B, and to someone who has never been in love, the actions and attitudes of lovers seem illogical and incomprehensible.

This is not to say that infatuations can't become toxic, as in an abusive relationship. However, none of us would say that no one should ever fall in love, simply because there are bad pairings out there.

The need to connect with the infinite is always there. For some people, scientific inquiry may be enough. Others, I have observed, are natural mystics.

I had a grad school roommate who was raised by staunch atheists but continually confounded her parents from an early age with her fascination with religion and eventually converted to Christianity --not the fundamentalist kind--at 18. I was associated with the Episcopal chaplaincy in grad school, and we made no efforts to recruit people, but students would simply show up, asking about when they could be baptized. I don't know why they chose the Episcopal chaplaincy instead of the Catholic, Lutheran, or Baptist or Jewish or Islamic or Kundalini Yoga groups, but I suppose you might as well ask why they fell in love with Person A rather than Person B.

I don't think that religion will disappear, but it will evolve. It always has and is still doing so. The churches that are in trouble today are the ones who think it's still 1950.

None of the major religions is the same as it was when it first started, and all of them have local variations.

Missionaries, whether Christian, Muslim, or Buddhist, have been most successful when the objects of their efforts have already found their current religion unsuitable. Buddhism swept Japan at a point when people were becoming too sophisticated to accept the nature worship of Shinto as the explanation for everything. It is making headway in the West today among people who want a spiritual experience without a god.

We'll never see a 100% atheist world.

[Kolesar]

50. None of the emigrants from the Soviet Union I have met are religious

The community that I live in has had a huge immigration of people from Russia and Ukraine in the last decade. Some of them are my coworkers. The ones that I have got to know personally are not believers. On Sunday morning you will find them in the metroparks, and not in the pews. The Jews consider themselves to be ethnic Jews, not religious Jews, and they don't go to worship.

That is my data point.

[Lydia Leftcoast]

57. My data point is the Russian emigres in Portland

who were mostly Pentecostals. I also met Russian emigres, including young people, when I lived on the East Coast, and some of them were Orthodox. (One of my housemates was American-born Orthodox, so I met them through her.)

I haven't lived in Minneapolis long enough to get a sense of what the Russian community here is like now. When I lived here twenty years ago, they were mostly the descendants of post-Revolution and post WWII emigres.

I should remind you that a lot of the "Soviet Jews" left not so much for religious freedom as for a convenient ticket out of the Soviet Union. They include someone I knew in graduate school, who got out as "Soviet Jew" simply because he had a typically Jewish name, thanks to one grandfather, even though this would not make him Jewish according to Jewish law, which traces affiliation through the mother.

[Kolesar]

63. Understood. Thank you

[Strapping Buck]

26. Not the Catholic Church

"I suspect that we should find several occasions when Christendom was thus to all appearance hollowed out from within by doubt and indifference, so that only the old Christian shell stood as the pagan shell had stood so long. But the difference is that in every such case, the sons were fanatical for the faith where the fathers had been slack about it. This is obvious in the case of the transition from the Renaissance to the Counter-Reformation. It is obvious in the case of a transition from the eighteenth century to the many Catholic revivals of our own time . . . At least five times, . . . with the Arian and the Albigensian, with the Humanist sceptic, after Voltaire and after Darwin, the Faith has to all appearance gone to the dogs. In each of these five cases it was the dog that died."

- G.K. Chesterton from The Everlasting Man

[starroute]

34. By the standards of art, Christianity died with the Renaissance

The last unambiguously great Christian art was probably Michelangeno's Sistine Chapel. After the early 1500's, explicitly religious art became increasingly sentimental and even tacky. The greatest artists of the 1600's were painters like Rembrandt and Vermeer, whose concerns were overwhelmingly secular and directed towards the material world (though not without a certain pantheistic inner luminescence.)

The early 19th century did bring attempts to revive traditional religious themes, but none of them were very successful. There is far more spirituality in the nature paintings of the Hudson River School than in some pre-Raphaelite depiction of Jesus as a little kid amazing his carpenter dad through his ability to cut once without measuring twice.

As "The Passion" makes amply clear, it continues to be the case that traditional religion and genuine art have almost nothing to say to one another. And if I had to choose, I would say (with respects to the Furry Freak Brothers) that art will get you through times of no religion far better than religion will get you through times of no art.

[Blue-Jay]

28. Not in our lifetimes, nor our grandchildren's.

Sadly, religious extremism (not religion)is something we'll be fighting until we die. Barring a public appearance by the invisible sky wizard Himself, it'll eventually be forgotten.

Ask me again in 3000 years.

[starroute]

30. The split between science and religion is a historical anomaly

If you look back at primitive cultures or early civilizations, all knowledge was of a piece. There was scientific data about the environment, the seasons, and so forth -- and then there were myths of the dreamtime and philosophical systems, explaining how things came to be as they were and the operation of the life-force which kept the system running. But there was no split -- the science, the philosophy, and the myths all worked together and reinforced one another.

Things started falling apart in Classical Greece and Rome, when people stopped believing in the old gods. The science got more practical, the philosophy got more abstract, and the new religious that appeared were increasingly rooted in fantasy and dismissive of the material world.

Despite various attempts to patch things together over the last 2000 years, we aren't in any better shape today. In fact, we now have two completely parallel systems. On one hand, there is science, with its own cosmological and evolutionary myths about where the world came from and what keeps it going. Unfortunately, those myths don't have much to say about human values or the place of human beings in the overall scheme of things. And on the other hand, there are the traditional religions, which have a lot to say about human values, but remain firmly rooted in Bronze Age science.

That radical a split can't last. In fact, I suspect it's a sign that the crisis of belief is coming to a head. We've managed to keep lurching along since the split first became prounced in the late 1800's, but the negative effects are getting more and more pronounced. The creative energies of our society are being drained by our internal conflicts -- instead of being focused and intensified, which should be the proper outcome of a full-integrated religious worldview.

I don't know what the end result of the healing of that split will be. However, I suspect it is unlikely to keep very much of the current religious structures, if only because the periodic attempts to integrate Christianity (in particular) with a scientific worldview have always fallen flat. It might resemble what is currently going on in Japan, where they seem to feel free to draw from a smorgasbord of different religion's rituals and symbolic systems, depending on the event and their mood. Or it might look like nothing any of us can imagine.

[TreasonousBastard]

32. Possibly....

but religion has always served some purpose throughout human history and will likely evolve to new forms.

Science has removed the cosmology from religion, and the acceptance of secular philosophies has removed much of its moral imperatives. not only Europe, but Japan and much of the rest of Asia have pretty much ignored traditional religions.

There are, however, all of those "Man's place in the universe" type questions, and the quest for a superior moral authority. These will probably not go away for a long time, and are often best answered by religion.

[Dob Bole]

35. Christianity in general will probably last

Granted, it may look different years from now as the culture changes, but while it's declining in the Western world it is booming in the Third World- Africa, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America-in other words, most of the world. There are actually far more Christians now than there were in 1900.

[GreenPartyVoter]

36. They will evolve

as religions have always done.

But I cannot see us ever not having religion of some sort. There seems to be an innate need for spirituality in most folks.

Would Jesus love a liberal? You bet!
http://www.geocities.com/greenpartyvoter/liberalchristians.htm

[myopic4141]

37. May not die out; but,

religious beliefs are going to have to trend towards less religion of belief if this nation is to survive. This is because religious beliefs tend towards "tunnel vision" due to taking an absolute truth position which will lead to an inadequate analysis of consequences by not accepting any information which falls outside the held absolute truth. Absolute truths inhibit compromise in negotiations via creating invariant positions. These invariants are formed because absolute truth does not recognize information that would modify the truth due to the definition of "absolute". To do so (recognize deviant information) would tacitly admit to the non-absoluteness of the held truth. The paradox "the only absolute truth is that there are no absolute truths" is a good illustration of the non-existence of absolute truth. Every truth has a greater truth to accommodate any new information that would come to the forefront which may modify an original truth. The best way to describe this would be using a friends inverse (upside down) pyramid analogy. Under non-absolute truth, when new information is discovered, the analysis begins from a single point to traverse through an ever expanding field of information until it either arrives at an established niche (supports a truth) or creates a new niche (brings to bare a new truth or modifies an existing truth). With absolute truth, the analysis begins from a broad base of niches and traverses through an ever narrowing field of information until it either fits within a defined existing truth or must be discarded. Problems arise in the latter due to some information being non-discardable (pesky facts that will just not go away). In these cases, convoluted logic or ill defined descriptions are used to hide any discrepancies. A perfect example of "ill defined descriptions" is the "free will" argument to explain the existence of non-believers in God. Problems arise when a Christian (a random religion chosen for example) is asked to explain in detail of how "free will" works. Usually, the Christian side of the argument ends at "one choses between options". Just try asking them where the "methodology of decision making came from" and have them "describe how the methodology works". A real mind opener if one cares to try it because every logical extension ultimately has God either directly or indirectly in control the decision making process which the Christian cannot accept. This, however, is getting off on a different track. The important factor which leads to narrowness of vision in an absolute truth analysis is the discarding of information that does not fit. At least with convolution or ill definition, the new information annoyingly works its way in which ultimately modifies the truth at some point in time. New information brings new implications to ponder which leads to a better understanding of situations which may in turn bring in more new information. An ever refining process which is good for everything changes with time (evolves). The greater understanding leads to greater predictability of consequences from actions. There are times when decisions need to be made with limited understanding; but, the more openness of the mind, the less the periods of limited understanding. Religious individuals tend to be accepters of a single source for information of what is. All take a position of absolute truth. All discard that which does not fit in. This leads to a misconception of what is acceptable to others outside of their own world views. One does not have to be religious in the traditional sense to display these qualities, only unwilling to accept anything that does not fit into their tightly drawn realm of thinking. Such closed mindedness and narrowness of thinking runs rampant throughout any religious community. It has become the bane of conservatism. We are in the current situations because of single minded believers who do not understand what is outside of their world view. Narrowness of thinking brings forth an acceptance which permits the religious to act outside of their principles in order to uphold their principles for they cannot see the contradictions between action and belief. The sad part is that this country is now rampant with narrowness of thinking.

[ArkDem]

40. or not.

.

[JasonDeter]

42. Mainstream Christianity will suddenly dissappear in the near future

and will be taken over by a celebration and a new religion led by an anti Christ. Someone will try to assassinate him and but he will recover and lead the world into a world war agains a tiny little nation called Israel. It has a happy ending though, because of God Israel wins and the world enjoys a thousand years of righteous living. Then another war. Then God destroys the universe with fire and creates a new earth and a new heaven. In that life there will be no tears, no pain, no death, no hatred, only love and peace and righteousness and wonder. Its gonna be cool.

[jimbo fett]

45. One day there will be Jedi and the Church of Elvis as pop culture creates

its own religions. A case of life imitating art.

[chiburb]

46. Man will never be free until the last king is strangled with the ...

entrail of the last priest.

Denis Diderot

[LibertyorDeath]

48. What a truly delightful thought.

Not soon enough for me or the planet. IMO

[arwalden]

55. I Hope So.

[asteroid2003QQ47]

56. "Man will never be free until the last king is strangled...

with the entrails of the last priest."

If we arbitrarily assign a time to when Diderot uttered his immortal words of wisdom, say—1748, when he was 35 and his life half over, 256 years have passed with precious little progress being made. After all, the discomfort of freedom can only be endured by a mature man, a man who has outgrown his need to be enslaved.
That said, all evidence would seem to indicate that it’s most unlikely the next 256 years will see any positive change in the human condition.

[MrSlayer]

59. Unfortunately not for a long time it seems.

Even those who are supposed to be "civilized" still have these primitive and superstitious beliefs that are so out of touch with reality.

[ArkDem]

62. Secular Humanism.

.