Religious Divisions? Science Unties!

This past weekend my Rev. Mother spoke at ceremony for the departure of a Protestant denomination church from its larger national network of churches. In other words, this particular church didn't agree with the decisions the other "like" churches were making, and so, made the move of countless other religious factions before them. They split. 

Shouldn't be surprising considering it's nearly impossible to count even the number of Christian sects. Something like 41,000? Read this if you really want a breakdown. And of course that's just one of the world's Big Six religions. 

Even more impressive is this artistic map of the world's religions. Though as I understand it, it's missing several branches of Islam. Is it even possible to list every version of religion? Since it seems no two people

can agree, we could simplify things by listing each religion by each person who believes it. How many people are on the planet right now? *Sigh* See this is why I don't dabble in statistics.

All of this is to say the longer any one religion exists, history tells us, the more divisions it will have because the more charismatic know-it-alls will disagree with each other.

Consider, instead, science. Mathematics has been called a language all its own. Those skilled enough to speak it (regardless of what language they speak at home) can have conversations with each other. There's nothing about mathematics that ever changes. As it grows, it becomes more refined. And as it refines, experts agree more and more as to what is mathematically right and wrong. That is to say, mathematics unites those who understand it.

We see the same pattern in science. As more and more knowledge is gained about our physical world, scientists agree more and more. Of course there will always be disagreements about what is unknown, what has not yet been proven. But consider human knowledge of the planets. Once thought to revolve around our own planet, today scientists have a more accurate understanding of how celestial bodies orbit the sun and are controlled by gravity. In other words, rather than divide, this knowledge unites scientists. They can agree about previously discovered and proved theories, and move on to other mysteries of our universe. 

In Sense and Goodness Without God, Richard Carrier observes: 

[N]aturalists throughout history, who arrived at their views wholly independently of each other, even in widely differing cultures, have all converged toward the same general conclusions and world pictures, ensuring that our worldview even if always a minority view, will still find more and more uniformity rather than division of views. Yet Christianity a thousand years from now will not be the same Christianity lived today, just as what we have today is not the same as that lived a thousand years ago. In all periods we meet hundreds of sects at fundamental variance with each other. Every other major religion faces the same story.

So, this defecting church, pulling away from its like-minded sister churches, will set out on its individual path of "truth". Once again claiming to have the only true knowledge of "god" and what that god wants. 

If "god" were actually real, don't you think he would step in a do something about all these disagreements? I mean, he could really clear up a whole bunch of shit by giving us Ten Clearer Commandments which actually tell us something about abortion rights, marriage rights, human sexuality, taxation laws. 

I mean, if I were Goddess, I'd want these things cleared up for sure.