I notice that many of the names for these native and indigenous practices have also been turned into pejoratives, such as “all that hoodoo and Broohaha”
11:21 So nice. I love your wholesome conclusions. They remind me of the novel American Gods when the atheist protagonist asks the gods why they care so much to help him when he doesn’t believe in them, and they respond that it’s because *they* believe in *him*. I still stand by the identity of humanist though I’ve done nothing to participate recently in the formal Secular Humanist community. I don’t believe in gods, but I believe in people who believe in gods, so their faiths are important to me because that’s the goo of humanity.
It's literally nothing apart from scope. Religion and magic both attribute things that aren't well understood to the supernatural. Both can sometimes be fun and contribute to a society but they can also both be detrimental if used by people with bad intentions and/or no integrity or decency. We see that a lot.
Paulo Coelho covers the idea of magic in a lot of his works. Most famously in The Alchemist. Another great book of his on the subject of magic is The Valkyries.
Agreed. It's very in-group/out-group. At least to my atheistic eyes, they are largely the same thing, self-delusions to lessen the existential dread that haunts us as a species that at once knows too much and too little.
