A Sociologist Finds Religion "Obsolete"


The most fun part of this blogging hobby is finding absurd things in religion and writing about them. Less fun is finding books and articles that say exactly what I say here over and over again. A book is just now going on sale by a sociologist at Notre Dame who explains the fall in numbers of the religious due to society no longer finding is relevant. No one who reads this blog would find that to be news. Yet, so many in the faith do not understand this.

The author, at the Catholic Notre Dame, is himself a Catholic. Yet he can come to no other conclusion after watching society and the church grow further apart. As he says, the reasons for the split are complicated and many. 

To me, the split follows a pattern we have seen since the beginning of human history. Think of the Greeks and their worship of their gods. How could the Greeks have ever left behind gods that were so revered.

The same with Pagans. When Christianity first appeared outside the Middle East prominent people said it could not replace the devotion for the many local gods that were part of Paganism. But, in both cases, the Greeks and the Pagans, the unthinkable happened. Why are both mostly today buried in the sands of time?

I think they are no longer important religions because the claims made for invisible beings could not remain realistic to the public. It was something like, "My parents believed that stuff. It seems like old mythology to me. It just can't believe it." This is happening to all religions in the world right now including Christianity. Like the doubters during the time of Paganism, the public is moving on. The outlandish claims of a dead man coming back to life no longer flies.

The sociologist in the link uses a nice term, obsolete. What exaggeration or outlandish claim of an invisible deity will replace the Christian ones is yet to be seen. 

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