are all focused on faith, not wealth How can you assert something like that? It's really quite preposterous. All religious organizations have a strong need t

are all focused on faith, not wealth How can you assert something like that? It's really quite preposterous. All religious organizations have a strong need to fundraise in order to continue to exist. Many churches I've visited are lined around the entire periphery with money receptacles that have candles on top. You pay a donation and then you may light a candle and access God, etc. The idea that faith motivates anyone (from clergy members to suicide bombers) is absurd. No matter how religious a person is, it's well known that faith is a goal and not a reality. Humans suffer from tremendous doubt. Angels, on the other hand, are faith robots which do not doubt... which is a consequence of their lack of free will. Humans are mostly the same. A sampling of San Francisco residents is likely to be just as prejudiced as a sampling of Alabama residents. Similarly, a sampling of Scientologists are just as likely to be corrupt as Catholics or Buddhists. As an even more general rule, all organizations tend toward corruption. What prevents corruption is not the virtue of individual members but things like transparency, competition, accountability, focus on results, etc. Religious organizations (and to a lesser extent political and corporate ones) have evolved and continue to evolve clever ways to avoid accountability, to avoid transparency, etc. Secular organizations suffer a big comparative disadvantage in that the results they claim to have delivered are typically expected to be observable by humans.