When talking about the future of nations, people generally focus on large trends and big events that frequently make headlines. Of course, it is important to grasp how trade, economics and diplomacy change our lives, but among all that discussion, things that are more fundamentally personal are forgotten about. Countries of millions and millions of people are, nonetheless, made of individual people. The modern world does not fully meet today’s individual needs for interaction and community, and places of worship can address these needs, even using this opportunity to reinvent themselves. Reaching out to people and providing them with a sense of community is a purpose such places must strive for.
To start, I want you to understand that “religion” is a very broad term to use. The three major Abrahamic faiths of Islam, Christianity and Judaism are divided into many distinct sects and branches, and dozens of other faiths around the world follow vastly different traditions. Precisely because of this, I am using the term “religion” only as an aspect of being people have in their lives without being specific to culture or practices.
Regardless of our personal backgrounds, we as humans crave to be a part of a social circle — the need to be a part of a group is hardwired into our biology. Technology use in our modern world has facilitated this in a variety of ways, and social media has become largely indispensable for us today. However, technology cannot fulfill the need for genuine human collaboration — the kind of interaction that occurs in real life between people and creates a living sense of community.
For much of human history, religion was one institution that was able to facilitate that. Places of worship, that is churches, shrines, mosques and other such places, were “third places” where people would gather and share their social lives with others. Outside of observing their faith, having a place to regularly go each week gave people a place and a purpose to see others from their community.
This is not to say that today’s world has a problem that stems from a lack of faith — people are, and must always be, free to live as they please, and the personal matter of faith or lack thereof is not a question to be explored here. But as for religion as an institution, there are possible changes that can make it an active component of modern life. Religion today is a matter of identity more than it is a symbol of community, which can breed divisions and obstruct the idea of a collective. Reviving the purpose of gathering humans in a collective place should once again be the goal of religion.
This can be achieved by making any place of worship something beyond just a place where people go to worship. A primary cause for people to adopt faith today tends to be a fear of isolation, loneliness or loss of identity that is not quelled by clinical means. Religion can, therefore, focus itself on addressing these questions, making people facing these emotions feel appreciated in gatherings and looking out for their emotional needs outside of regular service.
Another dimension to consider would be local activism, something that religion is very much capable of facilitating. Religion was historically enough of a motivator to mobilize mass movements, political actions and even critical moments such as wars and crusades. Religion has the means to organize and guide people into collective action, which can be utilized to foster a sense of identity in their local area.
Promoting a dynamic and altruistic lifestyle is essential to fostering a social identity. Religion can encourage people to preserve local environments through nature preservation, study local history to enrich the knowledge of heritage in the area or promote volunteer duties to look after those in need. To a certain degree, religion is already involved with such things but fails to advertise the component of social activity, and people who are disillusioned with religion often turn to secular alternatives. Communities formed from these efforts are also useful to lay the foundations of bigger movements across counties and states — grassroots movements can scale up sustainably if the people put trust and value into their own contribution to their communities.
We may worry about political problems such as turnout levels and divides between genders or generations, but in the end, we must first tackle the issue of making the modern person a part of a bigger group again. It is a form of apathy that isolates and restricts humans from society, which is the root cause behind most common psychological issues today. These are secular problems that religion can play a part in resolving, and in doing so, religion may discover its purpose and meaning for the rest of the century, too.
Deniz Gulay is a sophomore double-majoring in history and Russian.
Views expressed in the opinions pages represent the opinions of the columnists. The only piece that represents the view of the Pipe Dream Editorial Board is the staff editorial.