One thing I thought I’d never do…
… is found a religion.
Well, crap.
Don’t worry, I still don’t believe in gods, devils, faeries, Santa or The Easter Bunny.
“How,” you may ask, “can you have a religion without a god?”
Good question. While your common, off the shelf religion is typically centered on a god as a target of worship, praise and adoration, there’s usually more to it than that. Most religions have a social engineering aspect to them, and achieve their goals through intimidation, peer pressure and promise of reward in the afterlife for the righteous, and punishment for the naughty.
First, you can strip the god out of the equation pretty easily, and what you’re left with is a totalitarian regime. What if you could turn the social engineering on its head? What if, instead of operating on fear of a capricious invisible friend, you could operate a religion on promoting conscience, consciousness, personal liberty, personal responsibility, quality of life, and strength of will? You just might have a pretty powerful thing on your hands. If you could take the rituals and symbolism of religion, and use them as a tool for each individual to affirm the value of this life and his or her place in it, without straining credulity or forcing anything down their throats, you might just make the world a better place.
So, why not? Why not put together a philosophical framework and a social network and see if anybody bites?
Curious? Hop on over to The Church of No, Thanks