Religion as Power Worship

I spent a large part of my adult life as a Christian, where religious activity largely consists of "worship," which I have come to believe is one of the most pernicious activities ever engaged in by humankind. In this first post I will discuss the political implications of worship.

In Christianity, prayer and worship consist of debasing oneself before a superior being, of praising Him for his power and superiority, of thanking Him for His gifts and proclaiming oneself unworthy of them, and so on. This power worship is a feature of many religions, but is particularly pronounced in the Abrahamic traditions. God here is a despot; His rules are law that must be obeyed even when not fully understood; and most importantly: what He does, what He says, what he demands of you -- all must be qualified by the adjective "good."

Power worship is something that can only be done in the context of authoritarianism. If we were truly equals of God, we could have a conversation with Him. Instead, we must praise, thank, and beg from Him as we do of a monarch, since He is the one created us, could kill us at any moment, and will send many of us to hell.

Is it any coincidence that Christians, on the whole, tend toward right wing authoritarianism?

As a Christian, I could actually feel the gears clicking in my associative cortex. While raised in a democracy, I accepted that Christian cosmology was essentially authoritarian, which makes sense given the time and place in which it developed, and I tried to find some consistent way of being a modern who believed in democracy while accepting a traditional view of Christian theology, with all its implications for the natural order (including how we organize our power structures). Let me tell you, I had to ignore a lot of cognitive dissonance to make it work for myself.

The traditionalist Catholic or Orthodox Christian who believes that monarchy is the only God-ordained and approved form of government is crazy, but at least he or she is crazy in a consistent way. On the other hand, the orthodox Catholic, for example, tries to be faithful to two contradictory traditions: that before the Second Vatican Council, which was for the most part reactionary, and that afterward, which embraced many Enlightenment values.

Many intelligent people pull this off... but like any contradiction, it cannot be lived by the majority of people for long. Enlightenment values are so superior to, and so incompatible with, traditional Christian values that the former eventually triumph, and people in technologically advanced countries (where you don't have to pray to God for rain so your family won't die) abandon Christianity in ever greater numbers.

I think this internal contradiction is created, in large part, by the power worship inherent in Christianity, and I think power worship is so inseparable from Christianity that there truly exists a cultural war of sorts between traditional religion and modern democratic values. Thus, I no longer believe that it is reasonable or even possible to be a committed traditional Christian and a full member of democratic society (at least, not without a good dollop of self-deception). The siren's call of authoritarianism is too strong. As for liberal Christianity, that always was a stepping stone at best, and more and more people are abandoning it as its cultural value diminishes.