> The truth is more probably that atheism is a luxury of over-educated
> comparatively wealthy intellectual brats, while religion is the last
> resort of the poor and the working classes. I would wager that there
> is even today a significant portion of the "religious" who think of
> god or go to church for a moment of peace and comfort, to hope for a
> second for some relief, some higher order, meaning, purpose.
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You would have had to have grown up in a working class community where
socialist thought was deeply entrenched to have appreciated that a
"significant portion" of those living there - the ones with the liveliest
and most enquiring minds - resented the clergy, whom they often derided as
"hypocrites", and thought their more religious neighbours were sadly deluded
in believing that the synagogue or church was where they would find "some
relief, some higher order, meaning, purpose".
In fact, there were relatively few devout workers in the more cosmpolitan urban areas, where attendance at religious services was casual and sporadic, more a matter of tradition than of conviction, and usually limited to the major religious holidays.The natural habitat of the religious was (and is) in the parochial small towns and countryside. To be instructed that religion would bring them a "moment of peace and comfort" would have sounded patronizing to working class ears. It was a sentiment often expressed by the wealthy and powerful, many of whom equated "athiesm" with socialist disorder, and wanted the working poor to instead embrace the genteel religions they favoured as an antidote.
Socialism no longer has any roots in the urban working class, whose political colouration is broadly liberal, but religion no more has the profound influence you ascribe to it today than it had then.