In recent months I’ve read abbreviated histories of the Assyrian Empire, the Viking Age, the Persian Empire, pre-Colonial Africa, the Aztecs, the Mayans and the Anglo Saxons. This recent re-immersion into history has lead me to some thoughts about the role of religion in the past and the future.
For much of human history, in many cultures the political leader of a people and the religious leader were the same person. The king, queen, emperor, etc. were considered either anointed by a god or the gods or were somehow an extension of a god. Examples include the Pharaohs of Egypt, some Roman emperors, some Shintoist emperors of Japan, Incan emperors, etc.
Likewise, for much of human history, in many cultures a society tended to follow a single religion. It was somewhat rare to have a citizen or resident in one city-state or region worship a deity or pantheon other than the one(s) recognized by the political class of that area. In ancient times, when one group militarily defeated another group, it was proof that the conquering group’s god was superior and the conquered converted to the new religion by choice or by force. By the middle ages, you started to see some religious diversity, but not much and not without systemic prejudice against practitioners of the minority religion.
Americans take their freedom of religion, which includes the freedom to not be religious, for granted. The American experiment with separation of church and state was really progressive for the late 18th century. As a result of this principle, there are hundreds of protestant denominations in the U.S., including 60+/- Baptist groups, 30+/- Methodist organizations and a dozen Presbyterian groups. On top of that we have Roman Catholic, Orthodox, Morman, Jew, Muslim and dozens of other smaller sects that have congregations that freely meet for worship together regularly throughout the U.S. The government is expected to be secular while individuals can worship as they please.
Another, possibly unexpected outcome from a society in which religion is not mandated by government is the freedom to not be religious. Estimates vary on the number of Americans who are agnostic or atheist, but it’s not a leap to believe that number is much higher than it was 20, 40 or 100 years ago. But just because a group of people doesn’t believe in a god in the traditional sense, doesn’t mean that they stop ordering their lives around some kind of orthodoxy that resembles a religion.
In my post, Logic and Human Constructs, I discussed how humans love constructs. For the ancient, the construct might be, Our bountiful crop this year was because the gods are pleased with us. For the modern, it might be, Our people are behind in math skills because of systemic racism. In the early part of the 21st century, we find ourselves transitioning from the religions of the past to religions of the future.
The two new religious constructs that are emerging in the U.S. include a new type of religious environmentalism and wokeism based on assumptions related to race. Let’s look at these individually to see how they share traits with the religions of the last two millennia.
Environmentalism has been around a long time. For example, ancient Greeks had laws designed to protect the environment in their city-states. More recently, Theodore Roosevelt led the movement to set aside thousands of acres as national parks to be preserved for future generations. But environmentalism has evolved in the 21st century to take on religious overtones. The global warming phenomenon has made it easy to layer constructs on top of science to create a faith-based belief system.
There is scientific data that shows that the earth has been on a warming trend that aligns with industrialization from the late 19th and early 20th century to the present. To deny that the earth is warming is to essentially be a flat-earther. The constructs that modern environmentalists layer on top of this science have ties to beliefs found in many ancient religions.
For example, the Garden of Eden story in Genesis 2-3 describes how humans inherited a perfectly harmonious world and ruined it. Religious environmentalists hold assumptions that warming is primarily caused by humans, this warming is bad, and will ultimately result in the end of humankind and perhaps the end of life on earth. This also makes one think of the ancient flood stories, such as the story of Noah in Genesis 5-9 as well. God was so disappointed in humans, that he destroyed the earth, but chose one family to save in order to give humanity another chance.
Religious environmentalists also hold assumptions based on certain models that the earth will pass a point of no return within some period of time, with the most fervent claiming as few as 7-8 years. Unfortunately for this sect, they are falling victim to the same fate as earlier “end-of-days” cults. When the deadlines come and go without any fanfare, it tends to hurt their credibility. But like all eschatologists, they may ultimately turn out to be right one day.
Wokeism is made up of the more troubling set of constructs plaguing our society today because it pits people against each other in a more personal way. In short, if an individual is of European, particularly northern European descent, then that individual is deemed to be born with certain flaws. To the woke, Colonialism exclusively refers to what European empires did between 1492 and 1763. It is grounded in the belief that those Europeans believed (and still believe) they are superior to other races and ethnic groups. They disregard the rest of world history. Groups of humans have invaded, colonized, seized control of land, subjugated and enslaved people in Asia, the Americas and even Africa from the beginning of written history through 1492 and after. They ignore that what we call indigenous people today were actually invaders to the indigenous people who preceded them.
Religions in ancient time were catalysts that helped unify a people and its army. They were fighting for their land and their god. These modern religions are doing the same thing, but in a modern way. If you listen to wokeists, they regularly dehumanize those who don’t share their belief system in ways similar to the ways evangelicals refer to non-christians and Muslims speak of infidels. NY Times columnist Charles M. Blow recently wrote that Republicans are America’s Problem. The Brookings Institute recently published The GOP has become an insurgent outlier in American politics. It is ideologically extreme; scornful of compromise; unmoved by conventional understanding of facts, evidence and science; and dismissive of the legitimacy of its political opposition. Conservative websites do the same thing in reverse – calling liberals all kinds of dehumanizing names. The same Rush Limbaugh whom I praised earlier in the article said, Whatever you want to call it, socialism, liberalism, this is who they are. They corrupt everything. And he said similar things for 40 years.
People who faithfully adhere to a religion see those who don’t as sub-human and ignorant. Unfortunately, while Protestants, Catholics and Jews are no longer killing each other, it may not be long before followers of the new environmentalism and wokeism may be in physical battles with those who won’t convert. At least that’s what a study of history would predict.