Often the term religion is used to describe that which followers of all those listed below, structure their lives around, but really it should only apply to the first category, and some of those are a bit shaky!
Category One; List of Religions
Christianity: 2.1 billion
See below for islam, re-classified 1. billion
Secular/Nonreligious/Agnostic/Atheist: 1.1 billion
Hinduism: 900 million
Chinese traditional religion: 394 million
Buddhism: 376 million
primal-indigenous: 300 million
African Traditional & Diasporic: 100 million
Sikhism: 23 million
Juche: 19 million
Spiritism: 15 million
Judaism: 14 million
Baha’i: 7 million
Jainism: 4.2 million
Shinto: 4 million
Cao Dai: 4 million
Zoroastrianism: 2.6 million
Tenrikyo: 2 million
Neo-Paganism: 1 million
Unitarian-Universalism: 800 thousand
Rastafarianism: 600 thousand
Scientology: 500 thousand
Category Two; List of major pseudo religions:
Islam: 1.3 billion
This my interpretation. I’m sure there are millions of words in blogs and books to both verify and discredit my thoughts, but I think we should simply stop referring to all those in “pseudo religions” as “Religions”.
That one is the cause of a thorny issue, since they are so relentless and forceful in effecting the creeping sharia that they seek, not just in Dearborn, or Michigan as a whole, but everywhere! Theirs is a whole life discipline, harsh even on the inside if you happen to be anything but a dominant male in a family unit or power structure of one level or another. A picture I recently saw of about a dozen wome, er- humanoids standing around, all in black burkas, was downright depressing.
Their “holy” book, (which, BTW, appears to me to be full of holes alright), is a rambling, incoherent mess. The prime directive seems nothing less than to subjugate, tax, or otherwise enslave all others in the entire world who do not convert, kill the rest. They will happily kill their own if they find one who has converted to a true religion, or re-verted, in the case of their newcomers. The entire world is the goal, no veil there.
The morality guidelines seem to be only a compilation of all their iconic leader’s needs, once a convenient dream, with its appropriate vision and permission, could be had.
There is apparently, and unfortunately, no true religion of “moderate” islam, ask most any imam in a private mosque setting! The ones we believe, (or hope), to be moderate are simply in waiting, because when the call goes out almost all will go with the jihadi. In the interest of their families, more or less.
Could there one day be a modern religion of islam? It would be nice, and though all the rest of the world would be delighted, the hard core of what islam is today would not tolerate it any more than they tolerate anything outside their box.
And don’t start with the dangerous Christian thing. Christianity has officially given up senseless violence and sanctified beheadings.
The crusades which are so often used to illustrate that “most dangerous” concept were largely retaliatory, no doubt bloody, but to retake lost ground, so to speak.
The discussion I would like to encourage, (no not attacking me), is when you first noticed that islam was on a threatening roll.
My year in Turkey, (there’s another story of the hard core very lately coming to the front), was an eye opener, but I still did not realize it would eventually come to what we face today. It seemed an odd and primitive, but local worldview, and a society that let men send their wives to serve in kerahannis, (-sp?), their penance of crimes shocked me. Walt Disney’s magic carpet world was never quite the same.
My awareness of the ironclad view islam held toward the giant Buddha statues or anything else they deemed, was my turning point, they simply hated it, and thought nothing of depriving the world an ancient treasure. I worry about the treasures of Israel, Egypt too.
Eventually, several years ago, I came to read “Sword of the “prophet”, by Serge Trifkovic. That put it all together in such a coherent fashion that I was already well down the path to where I am today, after much more reading of others’ material, such as Spencer, and others.
So!
That is why I never use the term religion in conjunction with islam.
B.