Choosing my religion

[judgefloyd]

There's an old saying that you shouldn't talk about sex, religion or politics in polite company - which makes sense only if you want 'polite company' to be boring, since those three topics are what most of us are interested in one way or another*.
  Pigeonholing sex and politics for the moment, I've been thinking about religion.  I've been a member of a religion for some time** and I like it fine.  But I've been watching The Power of Kroll lately and partly envying the Kroll-ites.  Sure, their deity has been proved to be just a bad special effect and has now been reduced to a bunch of ordinary looking squid, but I'm sure they'll bounce back. Besides, Kroll swallowed the Fifth piece of the Key to Time, which makes it look a bit pot calling kettle black of the Doctor to sneer at Kroll-ology.  You've got admire the simplicity of their rituals - dancing a bit, saying 'Kroll' a lot, putting posh women to death by one of the Seven Deadly Rituals.
  So, here's my question to the rest of you.  Which of the numerous Dr Who religions do you like best? Is it the Calleach-worshippers who are tempting you to leave the Synagogue? Perhaps you'd swap being a Muslim for being a Mentiad***.  Would you give up being Catholic to wear the cricket glove of power on your bonce in that relgion on Leela's home planet?

Well?

yours curiously and religiously,

Floyd


* well, if you take a very wide definition of 'religion'

** note my gesture towards politeness in not saying which one

*** maybe not the best example, since I'm not sure the Mentiads are a religion

[judgefloyd]

Well then. Everyone here is either too religious to post, too irreligous to post or just not interested. That's discouraging but I'll press on.  You have an array of Who religions to choose from, including:

- the animism of the cave people in Unearthly child. Advantages: simple rituals, Disadvantages: doesn't stand up to a moment's rational scrutiny, living without fire, easily scared
- Islam, from The Crusades - the urbane tolerant Islam of Saladdin
- Christianity - two flavours from The Massacre. You get to be either Catholic or Hugenot. Advantages - both are real relgions, so you have lots of mates, disadvantages, you have to speak French, also I'm not sure if there are any Hugenots left
- Sisterhood of Karn - again, simple rituals - you just have to say 'sacred flame' a lot. advantages: you get to have pyschic powers and near immortality,  disadvantages: you have to be female and live on Karn
- Kroll-ism - see previous post
- Buddhism - as practiced in Tibet and the UK.  Advantages: it's real and quite trendy, disadvantages: run ins with giant spiders and/or Yetis
- Roannonism - as practiced by Leela's tribe. Advantages:the priest does all the work, ritual-wise, get to hang out with Leela, Disadvantages: must make futile attacks on forcefields


there must be lots of others but I can't think of them now.  Of course a major problem is that the Doctor is liable to pop in and snootily show you that it's all based on a lie

[Rory Pond]

I'll happily join any religion if it means I get to hang out with Leela. 

[Mr Lister]

Sorry, I'd have to fall in the "not interested" category then.
While I'd be happy to discuss religion, I'm not convinced that a) this forum is the place for it, and b) that the religions invented by the Doctor Who writers are worth choosing from.

[James (DWP)]

You can discuss anything on this forum and I see no reason to curtail this thread - I think its more at home however on the 'general discussion' board. Given its got a Dr Who theme to it I won't move it to the the 'politcs and other heated stuff' board. 

[Henry Gordon Jago]

I quite fancy one of those masks handed out in the Cult of Demnos...

[Ian]

How about the Cult of Skaro? 

[judgefloyd]

with the cult of Demnos outfits everyone looks good - and you can go and act in an original style Ancient Greek Drama afterwards.

There's also whatever Ancient Greek Religion was called - courtesy of the Myth Makers. Hartnell being Hartnell does not go and expose it all as a lot of cargo cult rubbish, although we get a bit of a hint that Ulysses is too smart for the whole thing.

New Age types may prefer that under the volcano mob of women who held hands with eyes in front of their eyes and......ummmm, well they didn't do much else, did they. 

[Tin Dog Podcast]

Apart from thinking that Doctor Who itself is a religion of sorts - see my podcast for more details on that...

ie. it informed my moral codes and opinions esp the Pertwee Era.

Non violence. Being open to posibilities of humanity. Science is key and power is to be used wisely...

.................


The Cult of Deamon is kinda cool... you get to read nursery rimes backwards!

Though... The egyptian gods are simply cool.

the only think i didnt like was that the devil was in that one woith the ood... and that goes against EVERY thing in early who...


grr

[Mr Lister]

That wasn't the devil himself though. That was an ancient beast, very old, and the source of many stories and legends all over the universe.
(Although it was said in this episode that this was "The Beast", it was shown later that there was more than one. So it was more like "A Beast".)

[judgefloyd]

I forgot Ancient Egyptianism - yet more Von Danekinising, both from Who and from Von Danekin himself.  As a religion it's nice and ancient, and I've read the Book of the Dead, which is shorter than a lot of other religious texts.  Disadvantages - you may be burned to a crisp by vengeful archaeologist posessed by Sutekh.  Knowledge of the liar paradox is an advantage.

[judgefloyd]

another thread has tempted me to add the following.  I'm not obsessive, honestly.

My full list of Who religions now includes:

Animism (in The Unearthly Child)
Christianity - Protestant (the Massacre)
Christianity - Catholic (The Massacre, and no doubt many others)
Islam (The Crusade, also that one in the hotel with the scary rooms)
Erich Von Danekin-inspired cargo cults (Mind of Evil, and probably lots of other ones, like where Turlough comes from - Planet of Fire. see also Talons of Weng Chiang and Meglos, Power of Kroll etc)
Paganism (didn't the original Master try to get a village to massacre the Doctor, a la The Wickerman? Also in The Fires of Pompei)
Whatever the Church Army is into (I like to think it's future Anglicanism, but we really don't know)
Buddhism (the Yeti stories and the Giant Spider one)
Whatever those Headless Monks are on about
Just being really nice (Keeper of Traken)

............and that's only the ones I can think of! No doubt fans with better memories than mine could add others. 
  I do think von Danekin and Enlightenment thinking cast a long shadow over Who in the 70s - every other show seemed to be about the discovery that what you thought was magic was really just science.  Recently there's been a bit of a pro-belief trend - that Muslim girl in the God Complex, got a lot of respect (somewhat undermined by it being just the same as Amy's belief that the Doc wouldn't rip her off) and the Church Army, although they don't discuss what they're into, get respect for their 'faith'.  It's the spirit of the age. 

[Darkglasses]

Two academics planning a book examining portrayals of religion in Doctor Who and its spin-offs are seeking written contributions

Sounds like the sort of thing you could contribute to JudgeFloyd, perhaps?

[judgefloyd]

From 'The Satan Pit:

"the universe has been busy since you've been gone.  There's more religions than there are planets in the sky.  There's The Arkovitz, Gorgonity, Christianity, Pash Pash, New Judaism, San Kla, Church of the Tin Vagabond'  There's also 'Neo-Classic'.  All we know about it is that they don't have a devil, just the things that men do.

Pash, Pash sounds cool...............

[judgefloyd]

ooh, and those cat-nuns that were on newnewnewnew....New York! The Sisters of Plenitude They mention the Goddess Santori.
  Suntori is a brand of Japanese whisky, so maybe the Sisters have a theology entirely centered around getting plastered and wearing nun costumes