The AEM has no affiliations with any religious
institutions (or any other types of metaphysical institution) and
insists that the state does likewise, and that this be a compulsory
requirement of the new Egalitarian constitution
(or any other
constitution). You are free to believe whatever you want to believe.
The AEM government will be happy to provide the services of administration,
staff, places of worship, and the full range
of media publications and broadcasts to any peaceful
religious institutions, which do not preach that social and material
stratification are good, and which do not harbour or promote
ambitions to overthrow Egalitarianism. These religious institutions
will be funded by the consumers/members of each religious
institution. But
never
will the AEM
institutionalise
anybody's religious beliefs and nor
will any laws or policies be based upon anybody's religious beliefs
(unless perhaps, if somebody's god does actually
show up).
Beliefs will always be beliefs. They will
never be facts, but the institutionalisation of religious beliefs
is to regard them as facts, and to manipulate people into accepting
them as facts. Aside from the fact that to institutionalise a particular
religion is not the Egalitarian thing to do, to force others, including
non-believers to abide by the rules of one's religion or other metaphysical
beliefs is just another form of institutionalised domination, which
always serves to benefit certain people in relation to others
(e.g.
those who represent the religious institution and those people who
support the ruling religion). And this prejudice and the public
suppression of one's religion (when another religion receives so much public mention and praise) create resentment amongst
the members of other religions. And this resentment can manifest
itself in many different ways, including extreme and violent confrontations
over many generations. While we haven't had too much trouble in Australia
yet, the AEM regards the institutionalisation of a particular religion
as a forever-lurking recipe for disaster, which need never have
existed if our leaders hadn't attempted to religiously dominate the society.
Perhaps, one of the motivations for institutionalising a religion
in the first place was because certain religious people in power
were afraid of another religion becoming institutionalised (which of
course, would serve to alter the power structure of the society).
In the AEM's metaphysically neutral version of Egalitarianism, you
never need to worry about this, one way or the other.
As you might imagine then,
the
AEM is totally opposed to any type of religious state or
form of rule.
Please note that the AEM also rejects
the institutionalisation of atheism. This would also
contradict an Egalitarian ethic. You might think that to
have no religions institutionalised is to institutionalise atheism,
but this is not so. To institutionalise atheism would require the
same things that we see with the institutionalisation of religions,
such as public holidays on famous atheists' birthdays, gift-giving
on atheists' day, atheists running
schools and universities, and atheism being continuously promoted
by the media and government. The AEM however, is prepared to provide administration, places for the
reaffirmation of beliefs, and the full rang of media publications
and broadcasts to any peaceful atheists or any other philosophical
belief systems, as with religious institutions. These philosophical institutions will also be funded
by the consumers/members of each philosophical
institution.
However, science is looked upon as one of
the few means available to us to determine what is so, and science
is at this point in time, extremely atheistic because scientific
theory is based upon what can be measured, observed, or experienced,
which means that science is based on physical phenomena only. While
scientific theories can often be regarded as facts, there are many
scientific theories that are yet to be proven, and there are many
things that science can't (yet) explain. However, both scientific
theories and religious theology, which relate to psychological and social
phenomena, have often been regarded as facts by the state when they
were/are not, and this has been done both deliberately (for
self-interested reasons) and
ignorantly. And this is something else that the AEM is committed to
avoid.
With most controversial issues, the AEM prefers to encourage the state
and the citizens to be less positive about such things, and to think
more like, "Well, we don't know for sure, but this is what most
people and/or scientists regard as being right", or "We don't know for
sure, but this is what I think (for these reasons)."
Religious institutions
(or any other institutions) will no longer be
the collectors of, or the providers of charity. On the domestic
front, charity will no longer be required, and on the international
front, the AEM government, on behalf of the Australian people, will
provide more charity than is currently being given, and you will be
given a say about which places in the world, or which humanitarian
causes you think this charity
should go towards.
You should also be aware that most of the
common religions that have been institutionalised do not support Egalitarianism, and are usually highly associated to
the ruling class of almost every materially and socially stratified
society. In fact, formalized religions actually appear to develop at
the same time that materially stratified societies develop, and
they are generally
believed to be associated with rituals regarding the ownership of land
for agriculture. However, if these religions can tolerate
Egalitarianism, we can tolerate these religions.
