Religion is a formula of rites, rituals, mores, and norms that are designed to build and maintain a community.

There are two types of people who are insidious to a community. Both are pretenders.

The first is a person who is friendly and helpful, but only if they are asked and told specifically what to do. Their trick is that they are very good at avoidance. Being a part of a healthy community means to be immersed. Members of that community then, over time, adapt to one another. That is what builds the bonds of a community; the people come together by sharing the same rites and rituals, but then adapt to each other outside of that structure. The Avoider never becomes immersed, and thus never adapts to anyone. Always on the periphery ready to take advantage of what the community has to offer, but never there to lend a hand as issues arise.

The second type is the person who does not avoid… they fix. The Fixer is like the Avoider, their goal is to remain on the periphery, but they make the things that draw them into the community go away by “fixing” them. When something is properly fixed, then the Fixer can easily remain aloof. A healthy community has many unsavory tasks and duties that need to be done, like cleaning a bathroom. The Fixer makes it so no one needs to clean the bathroom, which erodes the bonds of the community.

The tragedy is that both the Avoider and the Fixer are the way they are because they lack vision and conviction. They do not have a vision of their own life as part of a greater whole, or they lack the conviction to pursue it in earnest. Wealth and power are two of the most prominent factors that make people into Avoiders and Fixers. The poor have no choice but to be immersed in a community. This is how the meek will always inherit the Earth.