Religion and Society

But progress is contextual to whatever society it is you happen to live in. It's not that the Amish or fundamental Muslim societies oppose progress as a thing in itself, because I'm sure they must have their own culturally relevent ideas of progress. It's just that they seem to oppose what many people in a larger society (the Western society) see as progress.


Religion has been integral to whatever 'progress' humanity has made. Take Heidegger's theory of religion, and Bataille's theory to a certain extent, maybe even Nietzsche's too; they all show how religion started due to a lack of understanding about something, and has throughout history contributed to the furtherance of humanity to the point where now we are challenging the need for religion itself.

Perhaps. But consider that many religious traditions hold to the idea of a past 'golden age' in which the laws were laid down and given form by the legendary founders. Subsequent developments are often seen to be degenerate versions of the original 'golden age'. The Hindu mythology of history is basically cyclical, with the current age depicted as 'the Kali Yuga' - the age of Iron or Darkness. The effect is that religious conservatism is often oriented to the past, and fearful or distrustful of change and of the future.

The very idea of 'progress' is a recent, and distinctively European, invention. I would argue that one underlying factor was the hope of the Second Coming. This orientated followers to a future salvation, rather than to a past Golden Age. However as religious ideology has fallen into disfavour, the emphasis has changed to 'progress' in more political, economic and cultural terms, judged by GDP per capita, life expectancy, and so on. But the underlying belief in progress is very strong, and shows up especially in the tendency of secular modernism to regard past cultures as superstitious, obsolete, or stagnant.