"If society abandons religion, they don't really become secular. They start investing in all sorts of other things; you know what we might call a substitution hypothesis, to fill that space of the multiple roles that religion is playing in their society. But then an important question... Just because people are turning to different things to fill that function doesn't mean they are actually doing a good job of fulfilling it."
I believe Dr. Routledge is correct. Religion has always had a fundamentally important role to play in society. Religion provides, among other things, a dignified avenue for the poor and disenfranchised to get back on their feet in the form of donations, charities, soup kitchens, volunteer work, etc. This is now being increasingly replaced by the big bloated Welfare State with a terribly mismanaged bureaucracy at its helm.
As for core beliefs, Wokeness/SJWism, key tenets of progressivism, have replaced traditional religious principles and theology. It is, simply put, the new moral authority of our times. Being woke and telling someone off for not adhering to this new orthodoxy (i.e. not using the correct pronouns, decrying "mansplaining") helps these zealots feel enlightened and morally superior.
Camille Paglia raised this in her speech to the Yale Political Union in 2017:
"Perhaps the most pressing issue is not whether religion belongs in the university curriculum but rather what religion is already being taught now to college students coast to coast in the U.S. And that religion, I submit, is a toxic brew of paternalistic neo-Victorian philanthropy and dogmatic political correctness - a sanctimonious creed promulgated and enforced with missionary zeal by a priestly caste of college administrators and faculty censors in unholy alliance with intrusive federal bureaucrats."
Paglia might not have known it at the time but she was essentially describing Curtis Yarvin's concept of The Cathedral here, albeit missing out the corporate press bit.
This phenomenon is also what Michael Malice calls the degeneration of the Social Gospel. The entire premise of Christianity rests upon the salvation of the soul. This has now been inverted by progressivism to mean the salvation of the nation's collective soul - which is really nothing but a pure mockery of fundamental Christian principles.
This is best reflected in Screwtape's toast to graduating demons from Hell's "training school" in C.S. Lewis' 'The Screwtape Letters'.
"I would not encourage in your minds that delusion which you must carefully foster in the minds of your human victims. I mean the delusion that the fate of nations is in itself more important than that of individual souls. The overthrow of free peoples and the multiplication of slave-states are for us a means ... ; the real end is the destruction of individual souls. For only individuals can be saved or damned..."
Religion, from a strictly definitive standpoint, is the appeal to something higher - a higher being, a set of higher principles, etc. In this manner, Progressives and Atheists are as religious as Catholics and Jews - because they clearly appeal to a higher abstract authority (i.e. unfettered equality, human rights) to guide their actions and to justify their tyrannical crusade against the "unenlightened" (remember Clinton's "basket of deplorables" remark?), most notably in the form of obliterating and tearing down extant institutions and moral edifices that have been around since time immemorial.
Original sin is now the stain and guilt of the White man or any other majority racial group. All are collectively guilty of the sin of racism even if no member of this majority racial group ever individually took part in any form of racist acts whatsoever.
Is it the case then that belonging to a certain political school of thought or rather, a party, has likewise replaced religion?
I would think so. Being so blindingly devoted to a particular political ideology or party makes people feel like they are part of something greater than themselves; that they can contribute to the world and effectuate change. Joining political rallies has replaced the attending of masses or religious services. Being a political activist online and spreading the "correct" views and converting others to the SJW creed is the new form of missionary evangelization.
A friend I was talking to regarding this asked whether this means that political beliefs must be intrinsic to one's identity or sense of being the same way spiritualism is.
I answered that it isn't. It's merely a substitute and a weak one at that. The primary purpose of religion is to bring about change within oneself; it is naturally introspective. This vapid substitute aims instead to bring about change in society, to make one feel important in doing so. In the process, no one sees his or her own flaws. All they would want to do is contribute to a wider effort to turn society into a utopian paradise.
Let's also not forget that there's a literal dimension to all of this. Progressivism has its roots in religion. Literal religion. If you trace the roots of American progressivism today, it will lead you to unorthodox Protestant denominations that arose in the late 1800s and early 1900s under the wing of prominent “Social Gospel” thinkers of the time such as Richard Ely and Washington Gladden.
These denominations took Christ's gospel and applied it on a broader scale to the rest of society. As already mentioned above, it was always about the salvation of the nation's collective soul at stake. This movement, necessarily being an inclusive one, was ultimately captured in the 1960s by the libertines of the Sexual Revolution (but retaining the moral self-righteousness from its previous configuration) and what we have today is a bastardization of all of the above.
Another Protestant denomination which contributed greatly to Progressivism is the Puritan movement. Yes, the very same people that presided over the Salem Witch Trials. Before the United States of America gained formal independence, Puritan separatists who wanted to escape what they perceived to be increasing Roman Catholic influence back home within the English monarchy fled and settled in New England (primarily in Massacheusetts. See 'Plymouth Colony'). The Puritans were known to strictly enforce behavioural norms and it is a widely-held belief that they practised a form of proto-Communism in which all tenets of an individual's private life came under the purview of the Congregation.
In any case, Puritanism had a huge influence and role to play in the creation of further several Protestant movements, chief among them being the Unitarian Universalist church. As most historians concede today, the Unitarian Universalist movement planted the seed that eventually led to the birth of modern-day progressivism.
Everything fits together and makes sense in the grand scheme of things. Just dig deeper and you will find uncomfortable truths to contend with.
