People's Beliefs? They Be Changin
So the Times today reports that religious fluidity in America is way up, which makes me happy, but that, according to Rice University's assistant director of the Center on Race, Religion and Urban Life, "Religion is [still] the single most important factor that drives American belief attitudes and behaviors."
Anyway, here's the breakdown, so you ADHD kids can skip the article itself:
Big losers in the irrational monolithic meme wars of recent years: Catholicism, Protestantism.
Big winners: Syncretic faiths of all kinds. Agnosticism.
Other big winners, according to my extrapolations: Church of the Flying Spaghetti Monster-ism. Jedi-ism. Clean CSS layouts-ism.
America's biggest families raised by proponents of: Mormonism. Islam.
America's smallest families probably raised by: Infertile nuns who hate babies.
My picks for the "Whatever Happened To...?" file: Zoroastrianism. Mesmerism. Kris Kross (not a religion, but what happened to those guys?).
Craziest shit reported in connection to: Scientology. Self-mummifying monks.
They are called Pastafarians, please do not degrade their faith by calling them something other than what they are.
I didn't call them anything; I referred to their holy church, the C.o.t.F.S.M., and its implicit accompanying "ism," which - and here you are correct - I should have written as "Pastafarianism."
Thanks, Nate.
My apologies to any Pastafarians, pirates, and/or grammarians in the audience.
I wrote that shizz about the monks. I love those guys.
Word, big ups to Kircher Society, Curious Expeditions, and D-Rock for all my self-mummifying Small Wheel Buddhism esoterica.
Next time I'm in Nihon, I'm going to photograph the monks or at least their bodies, then write funny shit across the photos in MS Paint.
LOLSELFMUMMIFYINGMONKS.
But seriousl, big ups to Daruma, word.
I'm just being difficult. It's a Bruckert thing maybe?