Symbols
- Monkey-to-man chart
- Evolutionary descent schemes
Priests
- Scientist-philosophers
- Doctrinaire teachers
Ceremonies
- Courses & seminars
- Awards & prizes
Propaganda
- School textbooks & regulations
- Museums & documentary films
Founder & Heroes
- Darwin, Marx, Huxley
- Astronomer-philosophers
Scriptures & holy books
- Origin of the Species
- Naturalist journals
Financial support
- Government grants
- Institutional budgets
Hermeneutics
- Presume long ages of time
- Interpret all data by evolutionism
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Cosmic myth
- Origin = big bang
- Destiny = big cold
Ultimate reality (deity)
- Material-chemical processes
- Matter + energy + (long) time
Invisible powers (spirit)
- Cause-to-effect determinism
- Evolutionary directionalism
Personal experience
- Freedom from guilt
- Freedom to explore
Explanation of pain & evil
- Blame the "ignorant"
- Blame other religions
Afterlife
Logical consequences
- No ultimate moral authority
- No spirit, soul or non-material life
Practical consequences
- Social Darwinism, eugenics, amorality
- Intellectual bigotry & totalitarianism
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