Though my training is not in the area of religious studies, but in the process of trying to understand how societies develop and change, which implicitly means one has to understand social statics (over and above social dynamics) and coping mechanisms, I arrived at the conclusion that in my comparative studies of state and society, one cannot ignore religion. The issue is not whether one believes in what the people are doing or not but rather to try to understand why such a belief and practice became functional in such a culture, why it is maintained. We need a museum of religious experience to save all these.
From the point of view of how people become religious, of course the answer is simple: people learn to become religious from their immediate community or social context, and so the content of the religion will depend on the learning context and community.
I use the full version of this documentary which is similar to the one above, but of course now, because it is in a western context, people may see it differently. But when one goes beyond the context, what is happening is the same -- young people learning from their adults and what they see around them in their social environment, and their adults feel great and reaffirmed seeing what the young are doing. It is just the same as "developed nations" looking back at the single line of nations following them and when they see the developing countries doing what the "developed" nations expect to see, the developed nations feel happy and reaffirmed. Neoliberal globalization is kind of secular religion with its own sacred places and rituals.
This same experience we see in Nigeria can happen in Saudi Arabia, India or Japan. Here is the link to the six minutes excerpt of the National Geographic Documentary for those that have never seen it and have the patience to do so. The context this time is the U.S.:
Samuel
On Sat, Mar 5, 2016 at 1:16 AM, Okey Iheduru <okeyiheduru@gmail.com> wrote:
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