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How do you think religion in the West will interact with the Culture War in the next few elections, and in the future? Up until recently, the religious right seemed to be a mainstay of at least American politics. In Europe of course, Christianity is mostly an irrelevant force (though theoretically Catholics should have some weight?).
However, the evangelical right has been losing quite a bit of power and cultural cachet, and we're seeing the rise of more traditional versions of Christianity such as Catholicism and to a lesser extent, Orthodoxy. Buddhism has also made inroads in a more serious way, as well as Islam mostly via immigration of Muslim peoples.
In the future, how will these religions impact politics? Personally I see a fusion of Buddhism x Christianity already happening, and expect a sort of Christian orthodoxy mixing in Buddhism mental techniques as the most successful religion of the 21st century. That being said, I feel it could shake out in many different areas on the political spectrum - ironically, many of the Orthodox priests I know personally are surprisingly liberal.
One area we could see a resurgence is in monasteries, and the potential downstream impact in local communities. Within the Catholic community (and Orthodoxy in the U.S.) there has been a groundswell lately of pushes for more monasteries, and revitalizing the monastic order in general. We'll see how it shakes out.
Tell me, what do you think religion will do to the modern political landscape?
I think what will happen in the West is some mix of lebanonization, balkanization and brazilianization. The situation is similar to that of Yugoslavia or Lebanon or many other countries, where you have intersection of various ethnic, religious, tribal or even national interest in constant conflict resulting in confusing mess. There will be foreign shocks, I think it is almost inevitable to have mass immigration from Africa when the continent will inevitably be drawn into one or more huge conflicts of countries with hundreds of million of people. For religion, you can insert progressivism, christianity, islam and classical liberalism as actors in this religious conflict.
Culture War can lead to civil war, but I think that people in the West have a very skewed view of what it looks like. People like Tim Pool are too much married toward scenario of US Civil War or Spanish Civil War, which while confusing was more or less fought as a standard war. What will more likely happen is more akin to Lebanon or Yugoslavia, where decades old status quo of deliberately constructed balance of internal tensions slowly deteriorated, only to combust quickly, suddenly and violently. Or you can look into other conflicts such as what we now see in Ethiopia or South Sudan or even Syria, where you have incredibly confusing web of loyalties and where belligerents are unclear and alliances constantly shifting.
DRC (official population estimate: 100 million) has been in a state of chaos and civil war for decades, yet the amount of Congolese who have immigrated to the Western countries has remained comparatively small (120 000 formally in Western countries according to this link, even if you triple or quadruple this number to account for the illegal migration it would be less than a 1 % of that official estimate.
As soon as these countries reach some development/income threshold, the floodgates will open. Syrian Civil war caused huge exodus despite it being only country of 23 million in 2011. In hypothetical continuation of Africa's World War in 2050 let's say involving Nigeria with 400 million people living there, or complete collapse of Egypt if they will have huge war with Ethiopia with combined population of also 400 million, this will completely change the calculation.
And again, I do not think this necessarily needs to be some single source of issues. It is just one of possible outside pressures that will destabilize already fragile situation inside the West.
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