Defining Religion and World Religions

¶ … religion is challenging because religion has psychological, sociological, historical, and political dimensions. Moreover, the great diversity of the world's religions warrants an expansive and flexible definition. Features that religions generally share in common include the presence of a cogent belief system that may or may not be codified in written scripture, and which usually includes an oral dimension as well.

A sense of community and culture usually develops around a religion, creating shared norms, values, and worldviews that are tangentially or directly related to the core tenets of the religion itself. The presence of myths, allegories, and other stories are considered integral to the concept of religion. Myths may be cosmological in nature, explain the creation or purpose of life, or may be instructional as for instilling moral values and ethical behaviors in community members. By extension, ethical guidelines tend to be keynotes of religions worldwide.

Other aspects that can define religion include more personal, subjective, or psychological dimensions such as spiritual experiences or the sense of the sacred or profane. This would be commonly called the "religious experience." Moreover, the anthropology of religion includes investigation into the ways cultures designate their space and time in terms of sacred or profane. Even the most expansive definition of religion cannot encompass all the elements that comprise religion.

For example, Molloy (2012) points out that symbolism is crucial to the religions of the world, and that each religion may have different symbols denoting similar issues, whereas some symbols are unique to their religions. Ritual and ceremony also play important roles in the religious traditions of the world, as do attitudes toward proselytization. Religions provide the basis for many rites of passage in communities, and may even influence the foods people eat or the music they listen to.

On the other hand, an inadequate definition of religion would be "belief in a god or gods." Not all religions emphasize deity. For instance, most branches of Buddhism do not focus on deity but rather, on altering one's state of mind and practicing ethical integrity (Gacl, 2003). When religion is defined more by elements like the presence of myths and rituals, then it becomes easier to place Buddhism within the gamut of the world's religious traditions. Common practices across various world religions include pilgrimage. Pilgrimage serves different functions in different religions.

For instance, pilgrimage is considered essential to the fulfillment of one's religious duties in Islam, but is not expressed as a religious imperative in Christianity or even Judaism. Yet pilgrimage remains an important personal and collective journey that solidifies one's bonds to the faith community (Swatos, n.d.). Indigenous religions frequently feature pilgrimage in their traditions and experiences, such as the vision quests in traditional Native American religions.

Journeys that qualify as pilgrimages might be short, one-day excursions to a temple, month-long journeys as with the ancient Christian pilgrimage routes from Europe to Jerusalem, or inner journeys as with the psychedelic drugs used by shamans in their respective traditions (Molloy, 2012). Critical issues to the academic study of religion include.