What is "religion"?

I know that Wikipaedia information is not believed by everyone, but bear with me and read on. According to Wikipaedia “Religion is any cultural system of designated behaviors and practices, world views, texts, sanctified places, ethics, or organizations, that relate humanity to the supernatural or transcendental. Religions relate humanity to what anthropologist Clifford Geertz has referred to as a cosmic 'order of existence'.”

The trouble is that there are rarely, throughout the world, countries which agree! Word Atlas said that Christianity is an Abrahamic religion, the same as Judaism, Islam, Ba'hai and others. Hinduism, Sikhism, Buddhism and others are Indian religions. Taoism (or Daoism), Cao Dai, Shingyo, Shintoism and others are Asian. Wikipaedia has a breakdown of the denominations.

In Wikipaedia, Christianity was shown as at 2010 as the predominant religion, followed by Muslims. The third is atheism – no religion. What surprised me the most was that New Zealand, where I was born, had a 42% of atheism within their country! That % includes agnostics. I had a look through the 2013 census which was quoted on Wikipaedia as a reference, which noted 41.9%. That has increased a lot between 2006 (34.6%) and 2013 (41.9%). As mentioned earlier, 52.1% for the 2016 census were Christians – a large drop. The next census will be 2018 – I will be watching.

Gabe Bullard wrote an article for National Geographic in April last year, talking about how non-religion is growing - and quickly. Bullard said that the lack of religious affiliations has changed how people bring up their kids, how they react to death and how they are now living. And he said that “France will have a majority secular population soon. So will the Netherlands and New Zealand. The United Kingdom and Australia will soon lose Christian majorities. Religion is rapidly becoming less important than it’s ever been...” Maybe that's where it should end up.

In Australia the predominant religion is Christianity, including all the sub-dominant affiliations, but it's now losing out. The ABS stats report of the 2016 census said that 52.1% of the people in Australia were Christians, but a further 30.1% said they had no religion, which includes atheism, agnosticism and 'Secular Beliefs and Other Spiritual Beliefs and No Religious Affiliation'. What surprised me in this country is how many people truly believe that Islam is “taking over”, when, on the census, only 2.6% people claim Islam as their religion.

News Limited wrote in an article titled ‘No religion’ tops religion question in Census on 28 June that Australia is growing into a non-believer country. It mentioned 1966 as 88% Christian and has now dropped. Maybe that is why people like me moved here – a decent life, good jobs, good money... until you end up homeless, unemployed and in poverty. That's another story... but non-religion is the present. It should be.

ABC's religion and ethics writer, Barney Zwartz, a senior fellow of the Centre for Public Christianity, media adviser to the Anglican Primate of Australia and a freelance writer (he said), wrote in August about the demise of religion. Zwartz converted from agnosticism many years ago when he was 24 and considered himself up to date with his religion, yet “the fact is the world of religion, for most newsdesks, is an alien world, and as budgets and space have shrunk they have focused ever more on politics and sport, court or crime stories - which are cheap and easy - lifestyle stories, and eventually clickbait.” He thinks that “anti-Catholicism” is a new “anti-Semitism”. Could he be right? I dislike the fact that he thinks he is.

At the end of his article Zwartz quoted. The first was from Sir Noel Coward - “It is discouraging how many people are shocked by honesty and how few by deceit.” Coward was agnostic. He wrote “Do I believe in God? I can't say No and I can't say Yes, To me it's anybody's guess.”.

The second was from Joseph Heller's novel Something Happened - “Every change is for the worse.”. In an interview in Australia in 1998 Heller had said that “The only wisdom I think I've attained is the wisdom to be skeptical of other people's ideology and other people's arguments. I tend to be a skeptic, I don't like dogmatic approaches by anybody. I don't like intolerance and a dogmatic person is intolerant of other people. It's one of the reasons I keep a distance from all religious beliefs. I think in this country and in Australia too there's a late intolerance in most religions, an intolerance, a part that could easily become persecutions.” Non-religious?

The third was from a previous USA Vice President Dan Quayle: “The future will be better tomorrow.” I haven't read anywhere in his biographies that Quayle was religious, but that wouldn't worry me. What worries me was reading his quote in a religious article. Zwartz finished his article with another comment after Quayle's quote: “Isn't that comforting? But Christians know it is true.” Zwartz gave me a shiver up my spine. I'm atheist. If the future is better tomorrow, then seriously, we need a NEW government, NEW beliefs and NEW trust of people in this country who say they are “religious”. Unfortunately, religion drags money far too far away from Australia – and everywhere else around the globe. Poverty? In a country like Australia?

Atheists know it's true.