5 votes

One good way to understand religion is to break it apart

1 comment

  1. NaraVara
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    I honestly think this article should be standard reading for anyone with interests in history, religion, philosophy, or anthropology. It really gets into some core concepts that I think are lacking.

    I honestly think this article should be standard reading for anyone with interests in history, religion, philosophy, or anthropology. It really gets into some core concepts that I think are lacking.

    Nonreligion, ironically, shows us why it’s so important to take religion apart if we’re going to understand it. To talk coherently about the nonreligious, we need to know what they aren’t. According to the latest surveys, around a third of Americans have no religious affiliation. They do not belong religiously. But those same surveys show us that many of the religiously unaffiliated believe or behave religiously. They believe in God or a higher power, for example, or they pray daily or weekly. If someone believes in God and prays daily but doesn’t claim to be part of a religion, then are they nonreligious? There are a lot of people like this; they’re normal. What do we call them?

    1 vote