deciding what this world is

    When somebody out there declares that 'religion will be the death of us all,' what he is implying is that insofar as what we call 'religion' carries with it some distinctive orthodoxy, or dogma, it has already decided what this world is about, where it came from, and to what it is directed.  And insofar as these ideologies- or theologies as the case may be- contrast with one another, they will clash & compete.  Well enough if these religious adherents are content to follow their own catechism, or spiritual odyssey, but the real trouble begins when others- nonsubscribers to a particular cast of group-think- get projected as 'lost,' 'fallen,' or 'secular,' even guilty of profanation or blasphemy-- deserving somehow to get 'straightened out.'