Tomorrow’s Gods: What is the future of religion?
What is in store for the future of Religion? What will help it stay relevant?
Is the internet helping or hindering Religion?
I didn't read the entire article, but plan on coming back to it later.
I don't personally see religion dying out. I do see religion changing, though. I think in perhaps a few hundred years, many of the movements that no one has heard much of will gain traction. New religious traditions that have little dogma will gain popularity, as many of the Abrahamic dogma's become socially unpopular.
The nature of agnosticism will change. In my eyes, there are two branches of agnosticism... the 'don't know, don't care' variety, and the 'I don't know, but isn't it fascinating to wonder?' I think the latter will increase in numbers, and formal religion may die down. Religion will adapt to a point in which it and science are in harmony, and no longer conflicting.
I don't see the Eastern religions taking the same hit as some of the Abrahamic faiths are. Buddhism can be compatible with atheism(it is speculated that Buddha himself may have been an atheist). Hinduism adapts, and I feel it will continue to do so. It is the reason that it has survived for so many thousands of years...
I don't think the Abrahamic faiths will die out completely, but will be reinterpreted. Perhaps we'll see more Sufis; I certainly suspect we'll see more Baha'is. I just don't think the God of Abraham will continue to affect Western culture in the same way he has over the past few centuries.
The internet is both helping and hurting religion in the same way it helps and hurts all other avenues of society. It helps that it connects us with people and information that we wouldn't be able to access without it. It hurts in that it makes us more disconnected from those things we seek as it disconnects us from the physical environment around us. I see no difference here in regards with religion than I do any other aspects of life.
And as religion changes, I hope the divide between the religious and the irreligious dies down. I hope we get to a point where no one cares what God, if any, people believe in, and we're all able to respect and
appreciate our differences. Because if we were all the same, this place would suck.
(My own personal predictions, of course.)