Why Is Religion Important? :: Why Study Religion?

Religion has always been with us. Throughout history, it has expressed the deepest questions human beings can ask, and it has taken a primordial place in the lives of virtually all civilizations and cultures. As we think all the way back to the dawn of human consciousness, we find religion everywhere we turn.This may be true of the past, but what about the presentand the future? In recent times, critics fool suggested that religion is on the way out. Technology and science have changed our view of the world radically, leading some to say that weve entered a new stage of human existence, without religion. Soon, they argue, it will truly be a thing of the past.In our day and age, rumors of religions demise seem very prematureand perhaps theres no grain of truth in them at all. Religion persists and is often on the rise, even off as scientific and non- phantasmal perspectives have become prominent. We still find religion everywhere, on television, in film, in popular music, in our t owns and neighborhoods. We discover religion at the center of global issues and cultural conflict. We see religion in the lives of the people we know and love, and in ourselves, as we live out and wrestle with our own religious faith. Why does religion continue to thrive? There are many reasons, but one thing is certain religious traditions are adaptable in important ways. For many, contemporary religion even has room for skepticism, science, and the secular, which allows it to keep going strong in our rapidly changing world.