Religions Around The World

Scientology - L. Ron Hubbard is the Grandaddy of Invented Religions for Fun and Profit. Click here for the Official Church home page. To find out what Scientology's been up to recently, just do a search on "Scientology" on any search engine, and I guarantee there'll be no dearth of information available. ;)

Islam - Guess what! Not all Muslims are scimitar-waving, bomb-crazy religious fanatics, which just goes to show you that fundamentalism is the bane of any religion. Find out about the Five Pillars of the Faith and what's really in the Koran.

The Baha'i Faith - Intelligent monotheism in a world that desperately needs it. Although I question their contention that they're the "second most widespread religion on earth", it should be, anyway. (Although a Baha'iist told me that claim originates from them allegedly being in more countries than any other religion.) Baha'iism teaches that racial prejudice is destructive, that men and women are equal, that all major faiths come from God, that everyone should be educated, that science is not the enemy of religion, that one must independently discover truth for one's self, and that God's creation is essentially good. Clearly, this dangerous faith must be destroyed before it makes the world safe for peace and harmony!!!

Jews for Jesus - I haven't yet figured out how you can combine these two religions, one of which is waiting for Jesus to come, and the other of which is waiting for him to come again, but these folks seem to think they know what they're doing.

Church of All Worlds - Did you ever read Robert Heinlein's "Stranger In A Strange Land"? These people did, and they founded an honest-to-Goddess religion based on the ideas of Michael Valentine Smith.

Wicca - If your god's dead, try one of theirs! This is a nature-based religion honoring both a God and a Goddess as the Creators of All Things.

Satanism - Religion for the hell of it. I find Satanists less frightening than bloody confusing. Many of them claim not to worship the Christian Devil, nor to believe in any gods at all. So why do they call themselves Satanists? Maybe you can figure it out. At any rate, meet Anton LaVey, founder of California's (where else?) Church of Satan, the guy who looks like Uncle Fester with a goatee.

Taoism - Tao dooby doo tao tao, comma comma tao dooby doo tao tao...This is an ancient Chinese philosophy defining "the way" or the great flow of things, which you're better off flowing with instead of fighting against it. This god-less religion has replaced the Supreme Being with the Supreme State of Being.

Buddhism - A Buddhist orders a pizza by saying, "Make me one with everything!" ;) Find out the difference between Zen, Tibetan, and Theravada Buddhism. The Buddha was a fascinating holy man who lived in 400 B.C.

The Reformed Druids of North America - I'm glad they reformed because I don't like criminal Druids. ;) This is a bona fide religion that started out as a joke when some college students didn't want to attend required chapel services in college. They started holding quasi-religious Druidic services and began to find they were actually getting something out of it.

The Universal Life Church - Become an officially-ordained minister! I did! If you've never heard of the ULC, this is a bona fide religion and you can become one of their ministers on-line, which will give you the legal right to put "Reverend" before your name. The only qualification you must have is a pulse.

The Hare Krishna Home Page - "I'm just mad about Saffron..." The religion for people who are into yellow, look like Yul Brynner, and annoy you at the airport.

Unitarianism - This religion is Jerry Falwell's worst nightmare. These folks promote racial, sexual orientational, and religious tolerance, brotherhood, diversity, and other unfundamentalist-Christian virtues. This site is about a specific church in Santa Barbara, California, but farther down on the page is a good explanation of what the religion is all about.

Liberal Christianity - No, that's not an oxymoron! It's Christianity for the rest of us!

Atheism - I know, I know, atheism isn't really a religion, but where else was I going to put this link? Click here to find out more about the folks who don't have a prayer!

Aum Shinrikyo - Meet the friendly folks who brought you the 1995 Tokyo Subway Sarin Nerve Gas Attack!

Order of the Solar Temple - Jim Jones, eat your heart out! Ski & commit suicide en masse all on one great weekend.

Heaven's Gate - Who can forget those wild and crazy Trekkies who offed themselves so they could ride on a UFO travelling in the tail of the Hale-Bopp comet and achieve eternal grokness??? And you thought Scientology was weird!

Principia Discordia - Don't be confused by the Holy Writings (although that's what the Goddess of Confusion would like you to be!) but this is a real, honest-to-Goddess religion. Okay, it may not take itself as seriously as other religions do, but there really are Discordians who worship Eris. You will find them in the Neo-Pagan movement, generally hiding the High Priestess' athame...

Concerned Christians - This Denver, Colorado-based apocalyptic doomsday cult takes the prize as the first major religious wacko group to make millennial headlines in 1999. Although it failed in its attempt to hasten Jesus Christ's return by drawing innocent Israeli policemen into a bloody shootout in Jerusalem the first week of the year, you can be sure they won't be the last, as Israel is attracting religious weirdos like doggy doo draws the perennial flies!

Zoroastrianism - This was quite possibly the first dualistic religion to reduce the number of gods down to two: The God of Good (Ahura-Mazda) and the God of Evil (Ahriman). The similarities between this and the sometimes dualistic religion of some fundamentalist Christians cannot be missed. This religion was practiced by the ancient Persians and continues down to this day.

Essemian Sanctuary of the Darkside Goddess - The church for Pagan women who worship Kali Ma, like to dominate men and for men who are willing to submit their egoes to be trampled on by the High Priestess as she presses her bare foot over his mouth as he struggles to get away! Definitely for the S&M set, and passed on to me one who dabbles in same. No kidding, folks, these folks are serious. So serious that their site warns, "If you feel that you do not have a spiritual affinity with this premise, you should leave this page immediately because the Goddess Kali does not take kindly to lurkers or the insincere. We're not kidding, whether you believe in Her or not, this is one Goddess you really don't want to fool around with." I'll take my chances...

New Reformed Orthodox Order of the Golden Dawn - Beat me, hurt me, make me use a Packard Bell! This is a neo-Pagan group that started in college when in 1967, a woman at San Francisco State College was given a class assignment to create and perform a ritual for one of her classes. She got some friends together and they re-created a Witches' Sabbat, based on the materials available at the time which included Margaret Murray, Robert Graves and Gerald Gardner. But...they found that they actually enjoyed the ritual, and got something spiritual out of it. Thanks to Terry S. for passing this one along!

Rastafarian Temple - So anyway, Bob T. sez to me in e-mail, "Hey Frenchy, how come you don't have Rastafarianism on your this-is-for-real-weird-religions page?" And I sez, "Well gee, Bob, I don't know, mon, I never really thought of it. But thanks for the suggestion, I will surely add it on!" Hey, this is a real weird religion (not to be confused with a fake weird religion, of which there are many on another page.) But hey, all religions are pretty weird, huh? Anyway, learn about a religion that's about more than marijuana, dreadlocks, and Bob Marley...Take notes! There will be a field trip to Africa next week!

Society for Humanistic Judaism - Judaism for Jews who are atheists or agnostics but who still want to maintain their Jewish identity. They celebrate the holidays and learn the lessons but believe in the triumph of the human spirit rather than that of a divine god. So why's it here on the Real Weird Religions page? Same as atheism, it seemed the best place to put it, and as I said on my main page, atheism is as much of a wierd belief system as deism!

CADS - Christians & Domination/Submission - Beat me, hurt me, make me make you a chicken pot pie! This site is for real! Christians who have taken the whole ancient theology of female submission to whole new heights (or lows, as the case may be)! But they want you to understand...they're into MORAL bondage and slavery, they wouldn't want you for a MOMENT to think that they were into that sinful homosexuality and orgies and women voting stuff!

St. John Coltrane African Orthodox Church - Located in San Francisco, these is a real honest-to-God church...for 29 years, according to Chuck Shepherd's News of the Weird via the Independent of London. They don't seem to tell you what they're all about, but I'll bet they have a wicked good music program!!!

Embassy of Heaven Church - Just who *are all those nuts in camos with saucepans on their heads and Uzis in their hands? Are they wacko survivalists? Are they paramilitary nuts? Are they Christian cultists? Hey, they're all of the above!!! Click here to join this growing cult of 400 members worldwide! Hey, even they admit they're "peculiar" in their manifesto...

The Raelian Revolution - Don't be misled by the extensive discussion of the "Philosophy", the Raelians *admit* they're a religion, especially at the part where to join it costs you 3% of your annual net income (after taxes) or $150 minimum if you ain't got no money at all. These are the folks who are researching human cloning, and who have weird UFO/alien beliefs to rival even the $cientologists. Thanks to my e-mail buddy Lizard in 'Frisco for reminding of these astro-nuts!

Jehovah's Witnesses - They don't celebrate birthdays or holidays, they revise the number of pre-determined people who are going to Heaven as their numbers grow, and they get abused a lot by fundies for not being 'really Christian' (which is usually fundyspeak for, "Another religious group who's even more in denial of their Christian cluelessness than we are"). Other than that, it's your standard patriarchal fairly conservative religious group.

Santeria - These are the folks who made animal sacrifice a constitutional right granted by the Supreme Court in the early '90s...if you sorta like Catholicism, and you sorta like Paganism, but you can't figure out which religion you want, why choose at all? Go Santerian and slaughter a chicken for the Mother!!!

Church Universal & Triumphant - It sounds like a spoof on weird vaguely Christian New Age religions from the description on their web page, but they're legit - founded by Elizabeth Clare Prophet and based on teachings by "Ascended Masters". One of the "salad bar religions", they draw inspiration from various figures Christian and non-Christian. Thanks to Tom Hart for passing this one along!

Jews For Allah - If you thought Jews for Jesus was weird, wait'll you check out Jews for Allah! Salaam Alaikum, Bubbeleh! They're ethnically Jewish and religiously Muslim...

Santo Daime & União do Vegetal - If reality is for people who can't handle drugs, then these are religions for people who think they CAN handle the drugs! These Brazilian churches use a psychedelic jungle mixture called "ayahuasca" in their rituals. Years ago, I had a friend who wanted me to go to Ecuadar with her and imbibe something similar - with a bunch of headhunters! I'm glad I passed on the opportunity. Meanwhile, there are no headhunters involved in these religions, so pass the bong and let's sing the first hymn, "White Rabbit"....Thanks to Björn Danielsson in Sweden for passing this along to me!

The Body - Sometimes called the "Attleboro Cult" or the "Attleboro sect" because it started in Attleboro, Massachusetts about 20 years ago, this for-real-weird-religion has been making the news lately because children have a habit of dying while in the care of their parents. Most recently the body of a baby boy who wasted away from malnutrition after being told by a Body "prophet" that this was what God wanted was found. So far as I can tell, there is no home page for this group.

Yahweh Ben Yahweh - Thanks to FCSuper for passing this along to me! Y.B.Y. is yet another self-appointed Second Coming of Christ, this one an angry black man with a message for the evil whitie. (Louis Farrakhan, please take note!) This group has been compared to the Christian Identity as their black counterpart - complete with a message of racism, violent resistance against another color, and a mutual dislike of the Jews. They've been in trouble with the law several times and several members have spent some time in da slammah for it.

Thelema - Yet another this-is-for-real weird religion! Pioneered by the late British occultist Aleister Crowley, Thelema is based on his books and writings. It combines ceremonial magic, an acknowledgement of a wide variety of deities, and explains all existence through two principles: the Space-Time Continnuum and the Principle of Life & Wisdom. Thelema is an extra-heavy dose of weird, but then again Uncle Al wasn't exactly your garden-variety next-door neighbor...Thanks to Homeslice, who deified himself this week, for reminding me to put these weirdoes in with all us OTHER weirdoes!!!

The Church Of Body Modification - Yes, the piercers and tatooers et al have formed their own honest-to-goodness church. Pierce a nipple for your favorite deity, I guess...

Metropolitan Community Church - Who says Christianity is only for straight people? The MCC is a really-and-for-true-relijjin for gays, the transgendered, transvestites, and anyone else who doesn't fit into Jerry Falwell's narrowly defined boundaries for Christians.

Jediism - The Jedi Religion - Use the Force, Luke! I'm really not sure if I believe this is supposed to be a real religion. The U.K. made the news awhile back in 2001 when thousands of citizens wrote in "Jedi" for their religion, under the belief that it would become an officially recognized religion in the U.K. if 10,000 people claimed it. But it would seem that some were practicing this "religion" in all earnestness, horrifying more traditional religionists who think that only "real" religions spring from ancient history and that "made up" religions shouldn't be confused with the fantasy they are <straight face straight face straight face>.

Summum - A real religion for people who are into Egyptian religion but don't want to worship Isis ;) But would you trust a religion started by an ex-Mormon???

Alusi Okija - The stories appeared about a month ago - a sick, bloodthirsty cult in Nigeria that has been carrying out ritual killings. The remains of over 50 people have been found by authorities, some of them children. Nobody seems to be entirely clear as to what the reason behind the killings is, but it may have been regarding business deals gone awry. At any rate, this is one of the weirdest of the weird religions...

The Cult of Cthulhu - Haven't found a yes-this-is-for-real-weird-religion for a long time, but this guy emailed me a few months ago thinking he might make a good Religious Freak of the Week - well, maybe night since that's usually reserved for the Lord High God fools and abusers of spirituality - but hey dude, if you want to go and sacrifice a vampire to the Dark One, by all means be my guest and I'll reconsider. ;) Be that as it may, in the meantime I find a worthy spot for this site in my list of really weird religions, since he claims on his web site that it's a real religion. Who's Cthulhu, you might ask? Well see, it all started with H.P. Lovecraft, and.... He can also be found at one of my favorite comic strips, User Friendly.