Why, Religion, Why?

The current political climate in this country is fueled by an odd combination of Catholics, evangelicals, and fundamentalists. So, why are these strange bedfellows against abortion, contraception, same sex marriage, etc.?

The history of “the Church” tells us. Yes, I know “the Church” is not a monolith, but their differences within are small compared to the differences they have with secular/non-religious folk.

In any case, the history of the various churches is rife with a basic strategy and that is: to out populate their competitors. All of the above practices hold the birth rate down, you see. But the various religions promoted high birth rates by any means whatsoever. Then, after all the myriad babies were born, they promoted indoctrination of the children by various and often sordid means. Jewish boys were mutilated so that they would bear an unerasable physical sign of Judaism. This practice was also adopted by Christianity. Various “guidelines” as to how to dress, whether one’s hair could be exposed, etc. were all adopted to isolate “the flock” in the pen of the Church. You can see all of these in operation today, e.g. Sikh turbans, Christian dress codes, burqas, hijabs, etc. Various indoctrination schemes were implemented to stage the children up to full blown believers. And, these are still in operation today.

And now the Supreme Court of the U.S. is larded with people of this ilk who still believe they are fighting a war of attrition and that numbers matter more than anything else. Despite all of the signs that there are too many people now, the same bankrupt strategy is being employed by jurists who cannot think their way out a wet paper bag or see a future where we are all impoverished on a depleted Earth, but thinking they won because they ended up with more believers.

When believers ask “What harm does religion do?” Here is your answer. When religion is inserted into politics, it actively opposes necessary actions needed for the betterment of all citizens because of ancient practices they do not even understand. Right now we need to do everything in our power to hold down the population of humans on this planet. Religious zealots are currently putting the brakes on that effort.