I have always been surprised how little people know about the religion they profess to believe in other than what they were taught as children, especially their own religion’s history, nor do they have much understanding of their neighbours’ different religions other than news broadcast sound bites.

 

As has been pointed out by many – children are not born to any religion, they accept the religion of their parents, the culture they are brought up in and especially the religious indoctrination they are exposed to as children in churches, mosques, temples etc. Also in their educational establishments which are mostly religiously controlled except in the most secular and democratic countries.

 

Any child born to Catholic parents will undoubtedly become a Catholic adult, the same child if adopted by Hindu parents would undoubtedly become a Hindu adult. Exceedingly few people ever change their beliefs or indeed understand different beliefs.

 

I have been fortunate in my life to both live and work in vastly different cultures and observe first-hand the effects different religions have on people’s lives and behaviours. I was born, educated, lived and worked for my first 30 years in the UK, in a secular / protestant environment.

In my second 30 years I lived and worked in Islamic countries varying from the strictest (Saudi Arabia) to less strict (UAE and Qatar) and also the 90% majority Catholic Philippines. I have also spent considerable time in India, Sri Lanka and Thailand.

 

With many friends in all these countries, and also observing the general public at large, I discovered that the majority, whilst believing the basics of their various religions, tend to follow them out of a habit born of indoctrination, fear of alienation of family and friends, fear of losing their livelihoods, and in the more extreme instances fear of religious laws* and the possibility of violence.

* Mutawaa Islamic police force: in some Muslim countries, a police force whose duty is to ensure that the population complies with the laws of Islam

I often spent early evenings in Riyadh locked in a shop with a Saudi shop-owner who I did business with, shutters closed, lights out, quietly talking with only the glow of his cigarette showing, whilst the Mutawaa rattled doors to ensure no business was being done during prayer time and rounded up laggards and pushed them towards the mosques for evening prayers. He did not want to go to pray unless free to do so of his own accord, not through force. And in the Philippines the Catholic Church has had such a strangle hold on all aspects of public and political life and especially education, it is difficult to find any religiously free-thinking person there.

 

Yet all these people live very similar lives, working to improve their lot by providing home and food, love of their family and friends, trying to ensure their children have an improved life, better education etc. But when it comes to religion, these same sane people often become quite strange in their attitudes and behaviour.

 

I played chess with a friend who had cut both queens heads off apparently because they had crosses on them. In a shop Swiss army knives were on sale with the national Swiss cross (which is not a religious symbol) obliterated upon import by customs authorities – the Swiss government made an official complaint. Worked for a company that had to take down the triple international port shipping flags because they were flown on a pole structure that could be interpreted as a cross. Listened to people who believe that Atheists are in fact Satanists. Heard a reasonably well-educated engineer claim that the 1985 Mexico earthquake which claimed 10,000 lives was caused by God in retribution on wicked Catholics. After a less destructive earthquake in Pakistan the following year which still claimed the lives of many women and children this same person claimed that it was Gods retribution on wicked Islamic people! Not wicked people in general, but wicked people attached to specific religious labels.1

 

I was talking to a Catholic priest after the Chernobyl nuclear accident who said he was overjoyed by it, puzzled I asked why, “because someone in America has found a word in an old version of the Bible, in the Book of Revelations, which is very similar to Chernobyl and it says it is the precursor to Armageddon and the end of the world” and why does this make you happy? “because the world will end and we will all die and be reborn on Judgment Day in God’s presence”. 2

 

On another occasion I was talking to him about an interesting medical documentary that had been showing the benefits of professional medical hypnosis on certain types of serious mental illness, to be surprised to hear him say that any type of hypnosis was bad. Thinking that he had a medical reason for saying this I asked why, “because under hypnosis evil spirits can enter the subject’s body, in fact all mental illness is caused by evil spirits and the cure for mental illness is belief in God and prayer”, to me his answer was simply Ironic.3

 

Now all this was from a middle-aged priest, who did a lot of good work in the community and was generally a nice man, who had spent many years studying theology at Oxford, but worryingly was involved with the education of children in the local Catholic school.

  

Why I wondered do otherwise rational people suddenly believe and behave in such an irrational way when religion is involved? To believe in God is one thing, but all these other strange beliefs and behaviours are difficult to understand, and in any realm other than religion would be considered bizarre.

 

I think it is because the major religions (especially Christian and Islamic) teach their own version of the “truth” and try their best to stop their congregations learning anything about alternative religions, ideas or thoughts. Further, historically (and in some instances even currently) to tell congregations that other religions and beliefs are evil and that their believers should be shunned or even killed for the good of their own particular faith.

 

The major religions and their leaders have a fascist ideology, try to influence or even override democratic government policy for their own ends, ban literature critical of their beliefs or suggestive of alternatives, threaten their congregations about obtaining such information and try to block access to mass media information, all with a primary interest in maintaining the status quo for their own advantage.

 

And when religious leaders also have control of the educational facilities within a community and teach these same “irrefutable truths”, whilst hypocritically often not believing these “truths” themselves, people have little alternative to the way they end up believing and behaving as a result, thereby leaving them intellectually poorer at best and dangerous at worst.

 

However, today there is an abundance of easily available information on all religions and philosophies in the form of literature, mass media and the internet - enabling people to research for themselves rather than relying on the cant of their religious leaders.

 

Yet when you obtain this information on the different world religions, you will almost always find that it has been written by scholars, for scholars. It will contain archaic language, specialised language, be heavily involved with semantics and give far more detailed information than the general reader wishes to know.

 

The objective of this site is therefore aimed at providing the following:-

 

  • A brief and easy to understand synopsis of the world’s main religions and philosophies, their objectives in theory and practice, and their historical benefits and detriments to society.
  • A side-by-side comparison of any two religions or philosophies.
  • A section on education, religious and communist indoctrination, and its effects.
  • Encouraging the casual reader to become more interested in the subject matter and promote an understanding and tolerance of the beliefs of others.

Notes on content and editing:

  • The information on this site has been mainly obtained from the following sources: Encyclopædia Britannica, Encarta, Wikipedia, various websites, books and publications.
  • I have mixed content from the various sources, added my own contributions, notes and opinions, and edited based on abridgement, simplification of language, and pertinence to this sites objectives.
  • The percentages of world population quoted, who believe in the various religions and philosophies is based on figures from 2020.

1  In Italy an ultra-conservative Catholic radio station’s priest announced that the October 2016 Italian earthquakes which devastated large areas killing 300 and leaving thousands homeless was God’s retribution on Italians because their government now recognises same sex relationships - although the Vatican was quick to distance itself from the comments. In the same month a Catholic priest on Italian TV defended paedophilia. These people, although a minority, are very dangerous.

See https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/nov/05/italian-priest-blames-earthquakes-on-gay-civil-unions

 

2 Today the Islamic State terrorist group also believe that by fighting and killing everyone who disagrees with them, they will eventually create a global war, bring about Armageddon and the end of the world, and all true Muslims will be reborn in God’s presence on Judgement day.

 

3 As at October 2016 a Catholic priest has a department at the back of his church near the Vatican where exorcisms are carried out on mentally ill patients. The Vatican approved exorcism training in 2005. In 2022 the Catholic Archdiocese of Manila approved  Asia's first exorcism church, claiming that the Covid pandemic had created a surge in witchcraft and demonic possession.

See http://www.bbc.com/news/world-europe-37676977

See https://metro.co.uk/2022/06/13/asias-first-ever-exorcism-centre-will-open-in-manila-16820526/