The Guilt Machine
The survival of any salvation religion depends on creating the consistent sense in a believer that they need salvation that only that religion can provide. From the standpoint of Christianity, Original Sin as a concept does much of the heavy lifting to instill shame, but this is reinforced further by guilt. The best way to capture anyone and everyone is to make them feel guilty for something they all experience. Christianity does just this by pathologizing sexual desires and curiosity. Lustful thoughts, homosexuality, masturbation, sex before marriage—all of these fit within the scope of normal biological development. By pathologizing each of these scenarios—calling them sinful-- just about everyone going through puberty or early adulthood will be caught in the net of guilt.
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Equally bad for anyone’s psychological health is the guilt inflicted for natural curiosity. Asking questions about the universe is ultimately what led to the origins of religions to begin with, so it is ironic that religions now survive by doing the opposite—stopping any questioning about the universe that might undermine the belief necessary for the religion to survive. To take the Christian worldview again, it is generally required that one believe in one or more of the following completely impossible concepts: creation of the world from nothing, virgin birth, resurrection, heaven, hell, multiple miracles, and many others. Approaching any of these scientifically in Christian circles is met with answers of ‘not having enough faith,’ ‘God’s ways are not our ways,’ and ‘we are not meant to understand everything.’ Pushing further is often met with accusations of questioning God, which is a definite no-no. It is not surprising that so many major scientific discoveries over the centuries were met by the church with attempts to immediate silence and extinguish the ideas before they reached the masses. Pathologizing a desire to simply know more is bad for humanity.
