Re: My life of gaming: A closing chapter
I Don't believe the phrase "addiction to religion" is a particularly helpful or precise one here. "addiction" using James Griffin's definition that I mentioned above (there are others but I personally rather like Griffin), is an overpowering desire that has a negative affect on the rest of your life, your other desires, relationships etc.
One characteristic of such addictions is that their object is fairly simple. An alcoholic wants alcohol, a shopaholic wants to go to the shops and buy things, a gaming addict (as Patrick illustrated quite well), wants nothing more than to play games to the detriment of other things in life. "religion" however is a very nebulous turm. You can't express a desire like "I want to do religion", or "I will spend this evening religioning" it just doesn't translate because the concept of what "religion" means is so unclear.
A person could conceivably, (as some o f the renaesance kings did), become addicted to certain other desires that religious institution or practice could satisfy, for example a lot of medeival monarchies used religion as a source of income, while for many years the structure of the Catholic church provided a way for people of comparatively humble means to gain a lot of political power. Equally a person could become addicted to following rules and not thinking for themselves, or to the feeling of pridee and smugness in the knolidge that "they are right" However none of these are inherently religious attributes, they could occur equally in any institution that has some affect on how people live their lives from a sports club, to a company to a street gang.
What however people who are actually in a relationship to god experience is a very different thing, and only tangentially tied to their institution if at all, and as has been said I don't think "addiction to a relationship" makes much sens e as an idea.
so, while religious institutions or rules might be involved in other addictions, I don't think "addiction to religion" is a particularly helpful or precise phrase to use.
I however don't agree with cx2 that believing in your own absolute truth or trying to convert others by force or any of those other things associated with miss use of religious belief are to do with addiction, sinse addiction is an inherently personal thing. AFter all, there is a big difference between a gaming adict and a bad, unscrupulous developer, the same way there is a difference between a drug adict (even one who treats other badly while on drugs), and a drug dealer who orces drugs on others in order to addict them.
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