What do you think about this? Would you find it offensive if it was suggested that say Catholosism was altered through alien intervention? I just don't know if something like this would be worth the possible flak from it.
Write the story you want to tell, its only a story.
I disagree with the above post. Its better to target all religions than single one out. Singling one out is prejudical, targetting them all is fiction.
Write the story you want to write; worry about who gets offended later.
If you want to target all religions, try to find something in common (difficult as this is). Just a suggestion.
-Leave it as is
-Re-write to reduce offensive over-tones
-Re-write in a different milieu (some authors love speculative fiction because you can be more honest about your plot and characters; readers are often times more open to the concept if it is set "A long time ago, in a galaxy far, far away...")
-Re-write to change the era. Steer clear of modern religions and belief systems by setting your story in an ancient civilization.
-Decide it was good practice and move on to your next big project
-Or some other option that comes to you in the middle of the night by the light of the silvery moon...Or the one placed in your mind by the aliens who prompted you to write this story in the first place.
[This message has been edited by Robyn_Hood (edited October 19, 2005).]
As to targetting one religion or many, it depends upon what you want to say with the story. Targetting one religion has the problem of sounding incredibly judgmental to that one religion. For example, if you picked Catholocism (especially if you don't pick any other type of Christianity) I will not read the story. But plenty of people will be cheering you on. (Catholic bashing is awfully darn popular, especially in the south. I lived in Texas for about a year...good lord you'd think I was the devil.)
If you have the aliens manipulating the human race through all religions, then you may offend everyone or you may not offend anyone because no one feels personally attacked. Have you ever known someone who made fun of basolutely everyone and everything? Sure, they hit on stuff you care about sometimes but you manage to find them funny because nothing's sacred. (I knew a guy like this in college.)
But it's a different story. Now, we're suggesting that the aliens are using a worldwide system of diverse religions to control humanity. Wow. Think of the wars they've started. The tension. The bigotry. Did they plan every aspect of the worldwide dynamic or are parts of it an accident? Did they work with preexisting religions are did they make them all up from the word go?
IMHO, that would be a fascinating story, but you're still going to offend people. 
But to sum up, I go back to my original message: write it and don't worry about offending people.
P.S. I can't help but add this; I probably shouldn't. If you do go with one religion you're going to find it very hard to fend off criticism that you are doing anything more than bashing that one religion. Maybe in your mind you can extrapolate and think you could have meant any religion, but I don't think people are going to read it that way and even if they do, they'll wonder why you picked religion X, whatever it was.
P.P.S. If you do go with one religion, how about making it up? Do an alternate history sort of approach with one popular religion that doesn't really exist in the real world but can represent the idea that any one of our religions might be being manipulated?
[This message has been edited by Christine (edited October 19, 2005).]
In their Sci Fi OSC and Bradbury used real religions and cast them in a positive light using individual seekers to illustrate points. Heinlein and Herbert invented religions which were similar to Islam and Christianity in form but not beliefs.
Walter M. Miller, Jr. in his 1959 classic, "A Canticle for Leibowitz" conjectured the natural evolution of the Catholic Church into something entirely unique. He chose to have the religion evolve to something similar in form and belief, but subtly changed.
What if you made the protagonists members of the affected religions who were trying to expose the changes? You could then compare and contrast their beliefs with those of the Aliens.
[This message has been edited by keldon02 (edited October 19, 2005).]
Since you used the plural, I'll assume that the aliens are manipulating many different religions, mostly with an eye to how many people believe that religion and how easy the needed revelation/miracle/judgement is for them.
I think that it could be an interesting story, particularly if you get into just how obstinately troublesome it is, manipulating a major population through their religion. Every time you try and get them to do something, huge numbers of them simply go off and start up their own new religion. Every intervention has twenty consequences that nobody could have anticipated, all that kind of thing.
Or not. It's interesting if you do it from the POV of a human learning about the alien manipulations.
Just look at it this way. Almost everyone believes that a lot of other people are being manipulated by false religious beliefs. So maybe they don't like looking in the mirror. So what? Try it and see.
Just to be safe, you might want to let the aliens manipulate political and scientific beliefs as well. Like, say they're the reason everyone believes that FTL travel is impossible, or that slavery is inherently wrong. That way it doesn't seem like you're just picking on religion. Anyone can see that the search for rigorous truth and just principles of government is a noble endeavor even if some &^$$#bob is messing with you.
Edited because I can't type anymore.
[This message has been edited by Spaceman (edited October 19, 2005).]
If you plan to offend, the best course of action is to offend equally. If you offend everyone, no one person (or religion) can claim you targeted them in particular.
This brings me to a pearl of wisdom I shall share with you. I used to work at a church. The greatest insight I gained about religion is this:
There IS no such thing as 'organized religion.' The term is an oxymoron.
As for offending a particular religious sect....blow your horn! People read to inform and sometimes to strengthen there opinions of an already formed belief. Pushing buttons is a great way to get your story read by many...
* Let it be about a made-up religion
* Tell it from the perspective that the religion is a valid viewpoint and the people who follow it aren't idiots. Case in point -- Star Trek: Deep Space Nine was essentially about religion, and the religion they used was the Way of the Prophets, which *was* created by alien intervention. But the people who followed it (in particular, the major character Kira) weren't idiots, and they weren't exactly wrong, either. So I thought it was unique (in video at least) in that religious things were treated respectfully and as worth considering . . . and yet it did exactly what you proposed in your first post! So it must be doable.
Alternatively, you could just choose to offend people. Maybe you have to. But if it were me, I wouldn't, because there are some things I won't do even if I get a good story out of it. I've got a pro-euthanasia story plotted, but I won't write it, not after the Terri Schiavo case. I'm afraid someone might listen to me.
There is what I call a "golden thread" that runs throughout all religions. Things like: God is Love, belief in an afterlife, the golden rule... you'll find some core concepts that are held as truth in all religions. By focusing on the golden threads, you will strike a chord that any spiritual seeker would resonate to.
You could open up your story to some very interesting paths of exploration, ie: do aliens believe in God? How are their religions/beliefs similar/dissimilar to humans?
There are many directions you can take with this topic. Don't not do it because you are worried about offending people. You can easily present the topic in a way that provokes thoughtful discussion instead.
Most of the time, it doesn't. Either the religion is so close to some ancient or modern form of worship that it might as well be that and be called that...or its so far out in left field that believability is sacrificed.
If you've got, say, some priests of some church that resembles the Catholic Church, but is called something else---why not just call it the Catholic Church? Most of these religions have been around for a long time and survived ordeals one couldn't imagine if one tried. Why not have them in your future?
I think communism is another interesting idea. It continues to involve about 1/4 of the world's population. Unless you want to make communism the last human bastion agains the religions.
There was a book years ago that explained all the events of the founding of the "Mormon" church (or as we call it, the restoration of the Gospel) as being consistent with archetypal UFO/Alien visitations. But it wasn't sci-fi. Sorry I don't have a title for you.
I'd also recommend the Nova episode that discusses whether Alien visitations really have archetypal elements or if they are superimposed by researchers.
Oxymoron: A figure of speech combining incongrous or contradictory words, usually for descriptive purposes.
The implication here is that religion is not well organized... aw, fugedaboutit. If you have to explain it, it isn't funny.
Hmmm...I should go start it.
Find out the facts--from the source if you can.
IE. if you pick the Mormons and start your story with Moroni L. Hadley and his seven wives, who drives his horse and buggy along I-15 to get to the temple where he gives his own blood in secret ritualistic sacrifices, or pick the Catholics and start your story with some college professor who believes that the church is hiding the truth about the Holy Grail--oh, that one's been done, hasn't it.
If nobody cares, that's when you have a problem.
The bottom line is, you write what you write. If you are afraid to write something, you have two choices.
Either write it anyway, you change it enough that you aren't afraid, or write something else. I know that looks like three choices, but the last two are really the same choice.
REmember Niven's Law: There is a word for people who confuse the opinion of a character with the opinion of the author. That word is idiot.
"I am not a member of any organized political party. I'm a Democrat!" -- Will Rogers
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I've been reading about the Maya. Their gods are sadistic demons, and their Golden Rule is "Be the victimizer, not the victim."
I remember someone pointing out that despite all our differences (in society), we're agreed on the basics: few of us have a mission in life of spreading pain and evil. But I think that's because we're Christian, Jewish, or modern secularist (which is descended from Christian). Let the Maya or the Moche or some New Guinea tribes show up, and we'd have a bit more (shudder) variety.
Maybe it's divine intervention, but I think another thing is that religions that make people not cooperate are damaging to society, and society thus is apt to get displaced by another that holds together better.
And if the Klingons existed, they'd never be able to get off their planet.
If the aliens-manipulating-religion are working to bring us to technological excellence, I think they're doing a great job. If they're X-Files aliens, they're promoting the wrong religions.
And you can't tell which religions are being promoted by aliens. Maybe the aliens are behind all the religions that seem really demonic, eh? They just have problems because humans can be obstinate about what they want to believe.
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Maybe the aliens are behind all the religions
... and politics. This would explain a lot of stuff that has mystified me of late.
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Not this ship, sister.
I vote for aliens from both red and blue ships. They're constantly fighting proxy wars by manipulating human society. It's a very good way of running a proxy war. Not that I know anyone that's actually doing this sort of thing.