>It just didn't make sense to me. For one thing, saying that religion is an ideology seems to me to be casting a rather wide net. A _particular_ religion is certainly an ideology, but religion _in general_ seems to be something less arbitrary-- one might as well say that "spiritual pain" or "sexual desire" are ideologies. It may very well be that the religious impulse is something that's nearly universal in humans, to varying degrees.
I have no such impulses. never have had. Unlike, say, sexual desire. Now it is always possible that I am some kind of billion to one mutant, but it seems unlikely. I don't even know anyone with irresistible religious impulses.
However I am aware that many of the underlying moral tenets of Judeo-Christian culture have been passed onto me as an individual and underpin the social structure I live in. So many things that I don't even question.
The relevant thing that is universal in humans is the need to be part of a society. Any society has to have some core values and they have to be passed from generation to generation by some process. Religious dogma is a reliable process.
Bill Bartlett Bracknell Tas