we squabble over the proper way to pray: which text editors and languages are best suited for earning god's favor? which platforms carry the mandate of heaven?
we have charismatic leaders giving sermons to rooms of the faithful.
we have charlatans grifting people left and right, with tricks of the light they swear are indicative of the true future of our species as willed by almighty technology.
but the tongues in which we speak are not for show, they're mathematically proven to be meaningful, powerful, effective.
to some, god is ever-changing and ineffable - to attempt to commit ink to paper to describe its nature would be folly, as by the time the completed book went to print it would be deprecated, discouraged, false.
to some, god is steady, stable, and best worshipped the way they've done for decades - to send followers astray with claims of new 'best practices' is to lead them down a dark, sisyphean path.
our religions build massive houses of worship that become the primary avenues of socialization for the communities they invade, displacing and shunning whatever came before them. once established, they extract tithes.
we sacrifice ourselves at its altar.
we sacrifice countless people in countries rich in rare earth metals at its altar.
we send missionaries to impoverished countries bearing gifts of laptops and promises that this way lies salvation.
we become self-appointed missionaries at home, seeking the downtrodden and promising that accepting a different version of god into their heart is the answer to their problems.
our religions have built and toppled empires. our religions are regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by rulers as useful. our god is an opiate to the masses.
our god aspires to be an omnipresent, omniscient, panoptical force that empowers the powerful to punish the sinful. because it happens to be real, it has achieved this goal already, to devastating effect.
if a technologist claims to be an atheist, i posit they may not have thought it through.