Little sleight of hand here. I'd arguably agree that things listed in other comments like weight lifting and functional programming and punk culture all share t

Little sleight of hand here. I'd arguably agree that things listed in other comments like weight lifting and functional programming and punk culture all share traits with religion, but "religion" isn't what was bad about the original comparison. Charity itself originally came from religion. The comparison was to Scientology, which on balance has all the possible bad traits of a religion and none of the good ones. What you're describing might describe most religions, but not Scientology. You can't practice Scientology at all without bringing in the extreme bullshit elements.