Religion in a Time of Crisis

Believing in God is a human strategy for adapting to change.

Having faith in god helps people maintain a stable life. Following a traditional God based personal or/and institutionalized system creates a climate that preserves sanity in an insane world. It relieves stress.

The Religious Experience is a Trait Selected by Evolution

With less stress we can adapt more easily to the requirements of changing conditions. Just like the stressed Doberman Pinscher I mentioned, many people are hyper susceptible to real and imagined threats. For my evolutionist friends, you need to understand that religion provides people with long term survival value. The emotions surrounding faith in beliefs are part of our evolutionary biology. The ability to know of god is a gift of evolutionary psychology. What we have faith in, is a defining part of our personal narrative.

Religion is part of humanities survival strategy.

It’s a strategy that has been time tested over the millennium and many, many, plagues and catastrophes. First and foremost religion is an emotional response to some event. It’s an emotional response that, at its best, is used to control undesirable emotions and help.

At its worst, religion is used as a reason to harm. I find the theme song from the Billy Jack movie a great poem about the harmful use of religion. It goes like this
“Go ahead and hate your neighbor,
Go ahead and cheat a friend.
Do it in the name of heaven,
You can justify it in the end.

The religious experience requires certain emotions be elicited through experience.

In times of crises the one thing people have an overabundance of is emotions. During a crisis we experience many emotions from fear to gratitude, all wrapped up in the narrative of disaster.

I have always felt the song How Great Thou Art elicited emotions that helped establish the feelings conducive to the religious experience. Music, song, mediation, swaying, rocking, chanting, and similar behavior are all rituals that support an emotional experience leading to the religious experience. The rituals of reading and the study of textual behavior can also play a strong role in one’s belief system. I have even had a rather strong overwhelming sense of well being and joy from coming across a water hole or oases in the desert. I classify a profound religious experience, the mystic experience.

Along with emotions, beliefs and faith (internal religious behavior) are maintained through prompts and rituals. The prompts can consist of establishing daily rhythms and rituals that support certain behaviors over others. Religious emotions are part of human nature. It is such a part of being human, most people don’t even recognize it when they experience it.

Throughout the Covid-19 crises and beyond, many people will find great comfort by practicing religious rituals during the transition periods of the day. From darkness to light, from morning to afternoon and from afternoon to darkness, these are the traditional times of prayer. Since before recorded history humanity has sought comfort from god during times of transition. It is even more so in times of crisis.

When transitioning from good times to bad and bad times to good, people will seek refuge in their beliefs, religious rituals, and God.

One of the problems with religion is also one of its greatest benefits. The modern religious puzzle revolves around the dichotic nature of love.

The benefit is that it holds groups together, promotes loyalty, and encourages altruistic behavior. The negative aspects are that group cohesion and loyalty encourages an us and them narrative. A, ByGod, my Got is greater than your got!

I think early Christianity was the first great western push to accept others as our own. Now this is the general direction of all modern religions. We all know god, even though we know god by a different story (narrative.)

An important part of our narrative is what we believe in.
Heaven’s Banquet promotes altruism and helping others for the greater good. Even if we develop a segmented group we strive to help all.

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