The Conversion Bureau
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Simple query about how the contemporary religions are doing around the time of Earth's final days, like what is Neo Catholicism? What about Islam, Hinduism and the others.
7429435
Why would they change at all? Equus means there's an entire new planet of converts out there. Who cares if the flesh changes, it's the soul that matters.
7429435
7429998
In my stories, and in stories based on my take on the Bureau, there are some definite changes. The world has changed dramatically, both ecologically and politically, and religion naturally has changed to relate to the times it is in.
Neo-Catholicism is what the Catholic church becomes in sixty to eighty years (from the time the reader is reading), which is the date of my Bureau stories. The church has modernized, because it had to find a way to compete with the rise of Christian Mega and Gigachurches. There are twin popes (the second time in history this has ever happened, the first happening between 1378 to 1417), only this time it isn't schism - the church actually has two popes. They are a married couple, since in this time period, priests can marry. The two popes are two men, which also shows you that Catholicism has finally had a 'revelation' that homosexuality is normal. This happened just the same way the 'revelation' about the factuality of evolution occurred in the church. The Neo-Catholic faith is very modern in this time period, and besides sanctifying gay and lesbian marriages, they also are strong supporters of abortion rights.
During this time period, most other forms of Christianity have become minor, and the real battle for souls is between the Neo-Catholics and the GigaChristian Dominionists. Megachurches and Gigachurches (basically much, much larger forms of the basic megachurch) dominate the Christian landscape. They are fairly conservative, illiberal and narrow. They, like all megachurch groups today, are primarily about showmanship and money. They vacuum every speck of wealth they can from the vast impoverished masses that inhabit the globe-spanning worldfavela. Unlike the Neo-Catholics, they are anti-abortion, anti-GLBT, anti... basically everything. But they put on the best shows, with music, dancing, costumes, elaborate lighting and holographic angels!
Most other forms of Christianity have shrunken - Baptists, Protestants, and all the others barely exist anymore. All their members have been swallowed up by Neo-Catholicism, the Gigachurches, and the two new forms of Mormonism.
Mormonism had a Schism and became several religions, mostly divided along racial and outer space issues. Moroniism is essentially a white supremacist and strictly heterosexual religion which believes that god demands that Mormons grow to become like god and make pure planets of only straight white people in space when they ascend in the end. Moroniists loathe science beyond the 20th century, and see knowledge as dangerous. Counter to this is the other branch of what used to be Mormonism, called Nephiism. Nephiism embraces multi-ethnicity, gender and sexual freedom, and which considers all of the science fictional elements of traditional Mormonism to be metaphorical and not literal. They believe that god wants humanity to metaphorically reach out to the stars, and press beyond all boundaries to embrace everything that exists. They value science very much.
Islam remains, and is highly fractured in this time. Reformed Islam has adapted to science, reality, and the world, while Orthodox Islam remains mired in the past. Reformed Islam seeks to return to the spirit of the accepting, open, science-rich days of the Golden Age of Islam in the 14th century, before the faith became literalistic and narrow. Followers of Reformed Islam place women as the equals of men in all things, accept GLBT people completely, do not fuss with Halal or Sharia in any form or way; they are very much a modern faith now. Orthodox Islam, which is very small in the age of the Bureaus, are the remnants of those who cannot let go of the worst and most brutal interpretations of Islam.
Judaism still exists, but remains a minority religion - its adherents are scattered around the world after The Incident that turned most of Israel into a fatal no-man's land. It, too, has schismed into Traditional and Christianized Judaism.
Shinto exists only among a very few of the Wandering Japanese who can never return to their radioactive island ever again.
Hinduism is vast, and has made inroads into most other nations in this time. Many Worldfavela citizens incorporate elements of Hinduism into whatever else they believe - it would not be unusual to find a Neo-Catholic, for example, who prays to Saint Shiva or Saint Ganesha. Making saints of Hindu deities is not allowed, per se, by the Neo-Catholic church, it's just that people do it anyway. More than any will openly admit.
Buddhism has become a kind of default religious sauce, embraced at some level by almost anyone who is not some flavor of Orthodox. It is like a gravy poured over whatever else anyone who believes anything, believes.
So, yes, you could easily meet a person who is a Reformed Muslim who considers Krishna an avatar of Allah, and who meditates to achieve a state of samadhi. Or a Neo-Catholic with a treasured holograph of the Wedding Of The Twin Popes who prays to Saint Ganesha (on the sly) for strength. But mostly, you would run into a person who attends a local Mega or Gigachurch on the Hyperweb in VR, who doesn't take it very seriously, but who really loves the fancy musical numbers and the special effects. That would be your most common religious person in the time of the Bureaus!
All of this said, by the time of the Bureaus, only 40% of humanity claims to have a religion at all. Sixty percent of all of humanity in this period would consider themselves to either be atheist, or to be agnostic. Religious people are definitely a minority, and even among that minority, truly strong religious belief is very rare.
There are a few cults of note that are new: The Church Of The End, the Atomic Nuns (actually a Buddhist sect), The Church Of The Divine Mutation, and the Human Liberation Front sponsored Godmanism.
The Worldgovernment has enforced basic religious freedom around the planet, in all former nations, on all landmasses. It does, however, not support religion in any form. The position of the Worldgovernment is absolute secularism in governance. It does guarantee the basic human right to Freedom From Religion, something written directly into the Charter Of Corporate Liberties And Responsibilities, which is the basis of all civil law - in all Production Zones - of that time.
Nobody has ever asked this kind of question before. I really enjoyed expanding on the background you can get hints of in my books, and the books of those who write in my flavor of the Bureau!
7430134
As always, amazing level of detail.
probably not directly related, but ..
Re: science.
I was re-reading your blogpost just few minutes before, and one phrase stuck with me
Things is, I definitely had something I can only identify as hate just this morning. And over that?
Over this
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/astronomer-avi-loeb-says-aliens-have-visited-and-hes-not-kidding1/
I literally EXPLODE over this.
Most typos still in. Thing is, this ..... "science vs" really trigger me in very bad sense now. I still very much value accurate understanding of the world. BUT. Exactly looking at this FAILURE to recognize things as they are in scientists makes me doubleanrgy and triplesad!. Because this mean they not really discovered anything able to change even most intellectual (???) humans, themselves, over matter of extreme importance. And they definitely remain less than 1% of population, by way of thinking ...THIS is real kicker for me :( Because this mean very bad things in general ...
Of course this is not that you promote. But ability to say "hey, that's crap" at work, knowing it may cost you ..a lot still very rare ability. Way too rare for current world ....May be some of your books will help ..at least those few who read it.
Sorry, not sure if I should bring this load of past with me, again and again. But at least I try to honestly say that I feel. This doesn't make me anywhere near capable of finding ways to overcome this ...
You see, most likely me (at 38+) will not live into ... hottest times, but even decade can bring a lot of ...surprizes. Usual variety of surprizes, mostly.
I of course secretely hope "“One day, email will be a hundred years old. Then two hundred, three hundred, etc. Philosophy or literature scholars in the year 2500 will unearth forgotten or deleted emails the authors they are working on wrote several centuries earlier. . . . People will say: I found an old Facebook profile from fifty years ago, from two hundred years ago. . . . " (src) so all our e-ink spilled around will be not in vain .... but who knows.
7430134
While I figure that they don't often ask because the human element is not the main focus 'round these parts. Would be funny depending on you're view of Mormons if those guys are the only lasting remnant as they've pulled their Mormon money together to head towards Kolob :v
7429435
Your question implies “the standard setting” for TCB, however, I personally think that faithfully writing into that setting is like trying to write into the Myth or Xanth series in that there has been so much that has happened, you either have read and remember a mountain of books or else you run the risk of writing a story that has already been written or that ignores a major plot point that has already been established.
If this is what you are really inspired to do, good luck, but there is nothing wrong with making an entirely new setting using the basis of transformation.
7430490
I was just curious after all.
7430532
I enjoyed answering your question, terranalias18. Thank you for asking it!