In a universe where gods are very clearly real and very obviously capable of granting their followers divine power...

In a universe where gods are very clearly real and very obviously capable of granting their followers divine power, why would any reasonable person not be devoutly religious?

Also, Paladin/Cleric thread

Because some Gods have very high standards and some people have problems with the members of the religion, like a fanatic adventurer burning your family alive for being apostates or something.

Some will not follow out of faith, but out of fear.

>very obviously capable of granting their followers divine power
This is where you fucked up.
You are implying that gaining that power is as simple as going to church on the Sabbath and saying your prayers every night.

Just because gods exist I don't have to like them or their followed requirements be a reasonable trade for their boons.

Religion's opposite isn't atheism, religion's opposite is an ideology that wants to see the gods cast down.

The very same reason people aren't religious IRL despite the benefits organized religion brings -- politics; infighting within the religion; prejudice and bias; hard work; strict tenants; a toxic fanbase; too many restrictions; can't eat delicious pork; etc.

Ask yourself why religions are successful when people have doubted the existence of gods since antiquity, then ask yourself what would change if people no longer doubted the existence of said gods.

Gods have conflicting agendas, sucking up with one too much will upset the others.

That's another thing. If the gods are observant and heavy handed enough to take away a paladin's powers, you would think any asshole committing atrocities in the name of his patron would be struck by lightning before he set fire to the first cottage.

No one likes an ass-kisser.

Gods might be choosy.

Even if it's not, why would you not pick one of the large catalogue of omnipotent, omniscient deities to give you a helping hand. If all you have to do for a crop of bigger, sweeter apples every year is build a church to the harvest god and follow the rules they put down, you'd think every farmer would make that a priority. Soldiers would all pray to the war gods, sailors to the sea gods. Even vargants would have Avandra or something similar. Nobody who wants to live an easier life would be smart not to pray to something.

But the afterlife is infinite. If there are provably gods, and is provably an afterlife that can be improved by worshipping these gods, why not put up with that shit?

If you're only worshiping for the divine powers, are you really faithful?

It's never the case in any fantasy world, to my knowledge, that all the gods are at each other's throats at all times. If it is, I'm sure it's a grim and dark world. That being the case, most gods are happy to form pantheons, meaning you can just sort of feel out which Saturday morning cartoon lineup suits you best.

People still wouldn't be any more faithful because DnD-eque gods aren't about religion or Faith, they are political parties.

Sure, there'll be a lot people who throw themselves down before a greater power, but you'll also have greedy bastards making the motions for personal gain and people begrudgingly going along to avoid lightning to the face.

>Yeah, the Gods are real. Real bastards that is.

If you know for a fact that the gods are real, can there be faith at all?

Most persons would be. You would have a small group of people that are functionally atheists. They won't deny that the beings most people call gods exist but they either don't believe they are gods (just powerful beings that have not created the world, these divine powers are really close to magic after all...) or denying them worship because they reject their rule as tyrannical.

For that to happen you probably need an urbanized culture with a developed academia though.

The average person doesn't have time to spend all day praying. Like in real life, most societies will probably have a professional class of priests who perform the necessary rites and rituals on behalf of everyone else. From this class a small number are picked to have special powers.

The average farmer is likely to engage more with his ancestors and local spirits than the gods proper, leaving them to the professionals, except during special occasions like festivals or when he needs a special favour.

You would think so. If ony that was the way it worked.
Living as a slave forever to a cruel god or living a short life as a free person. Some people would rather tell the gods to go fuck themselves.

Because Gods might not be worthy of devotion

But if praying to Avandra means safe travel, wouldn't every merchant in the world pray to her?

Because as has already been stated, not everyone wants to devote their life to such a thing.
You are still working on the assumption you can gain power for lip service, when all the examples you can pull from demand high obedience to dogma, the devotion of your life and efforts AND be chosen.
called it, you aren't faithful, you are treating it like a business transaction.

In what setting?

If praying to a God gives you powers/benefits, sure, it would be stupid not to do it. But if you have to commit your life entirely and perform a serie of rituals, following religiously rules and ways of living, etc (like what clerics in D&D do) lots of people wont do because they lack the wealth, the time, the patience, etc

You'd have to have a lot of spite in you to tell a guy who says "Don't murder, don't steal, don't fuck your sister, and give me a bowl of fruit twice a year and you can hang out in my space garden full of wine and acid jazz music" to go fuck himself

Or, it's a case, the way it actually is in D&D, where people pray to gods that rule over certain aspects of the world, but that doesn't mean that god will pay attention to you and your circumstance.

>In a world with magic why isn't everybody a wizard? you only have to study for your entire life in a prestigious and expensive as fuck magic school

Because rather than be devout followers most lower class normal folk where be more focused on staying the course, keeping their heads down and simply not pissing them off.

In no story of mortals interacting with god does shit end without some kind of incident

It takes talent and skill to be a wizard. It takes fifteen minutes to pray

Some people refuse to give their lunch money, even if they'll get beat up. Same thing.

>it takes fifteen minutes to pray
In what setting?

Praying is just words, anyone can do it. But if you want the gods to listen you probably go the relevant temple and ask them to make a sacrifice and perform the relevant devotions on your behalf.

>he's relying on a demonstrably false assumption again
user, if you can point to any setting, anywhere, where gaining a portion of a god's favor or power can be done simply by praying and nothing else, than you need to put that shit down now.
At this point, you are shitposting like a motherfucker.

>implying being a devout follower of a religion is that Easy

>its more like

>don't eat fish and on sundays, mondays and thursdays you can only eat meat from goats

>pray 6 times

>give all your money to the poor lmao

>do everything my priests tell you without questioning it

>jerking off is a sin lmao and sex only twice a month

I want to know of this wonderful setting in where praying for 15 minutes a day grants you superpowers

No, it would be like the Catholic church around reformation.

>Wanna get that maker's daughter as a bride? That's three praises to the goddess of love every day and a loaf of rosebread donated to the temple of the hearth every fortnight, for three months each, good sir
>trespasses a graveyard, ya lovebirds? Silver coin to the god of death and an offering to an ancestor to vouch for you. If a child comes of this, off to the maces tower
>Want your child to become a legendary hero? I'll get the form

There doesn't seem to be a lot of consensus on what being religious even involves in this case

>everybody that prays deserves special powers

Because the gods don't fucking care for the faith of people?

The precise degree of proof matters. "god" in the Judeo-Christian sense of literal omnipotent being cannot be proven to exist but polytheistic or otherwise limited gods require much less evidence.
That said as long as your god isn't obsessively monitoring and punishing transgressions or instantly dishing out desperately needed rewards the amount of worship you *have* to show varies quite a lot by circumstances. People who are rich enough not to need divine power for example wouldn't subject themselves to any rigorous worship.
And obviously nothing can force you to feel sympathetic to the powerful force that's unilaterally decided to take over your life. For anyone who is feeling nice towards the deity they'll be someone who will feel they've not been given enough.

This is assuming perfect benevolence of all deities. As soon as one is even rumored to have fucked up you're stuck being unable to tell if the rest are just better at lying to you.

>Also, Paladin/Cleric thread
Ok, gonna assume you're talking about D&D and PF

Why isn't everybody devoutly religious? easy, because:
1. Not every god is worthy of devotion
2. You don't get advantages/benefits unless you literally sacrifice your entire life for the cause so why even bother

Gods can't just intervene willy nilly, or else the opposing pantheons could also intevene willy nilly and all the crops would have burned down in a plague of flaming locusts at the dawn of time and nobody would be around at all.

What benefits? And those are not the reasons I or anyone I know aren't religious.

Because in a world where the existance of gods is a proven fact, faith becomes irrelevant. In such a world. all a Paladin is doing is currying favour with an immortal autocrat, no different from a particularly powerful king or emperor.

And there are plenty of reasons why someone might not want to bend the knee to an emperor.

Paladins and clerics are far in between. Clerics form a very small percentage of the god's followers, they're not even all priests. They're literally people who do miracles. An average peasant might worship Pelor but he doesn't get anything for it beyond the usual benefits of religion.

>And there are plenty of reasons why someone might not want to bend the knee to an emperor.
Jon, fucking swallow your pride and bend the knee

Depends on how the gods are. If they're all powerful and offer actual redemption for afterlife, then sure. Most people would be devoutly religious, the exception being the usual oddjobs.
The problem is that the gods of fantasy stories aren't really like that. There's no point in being so religious over a being that could implement slightly on your crops.

Specially because atheism is a religion on itself.

Athe got some really sweet domains, why wouldn't you follow her.

because for all their power, the gods are just as dumb and illogical as humans
just last week I saw zeus raping som poor dame, and nobody stipped him

those sheep want to keep worshipping them? they can do it, but not me
I'm going to wizard college, bard college, heck even druid college, but I would never go willingly serve such capricious beings as a cleric

they want ny worship and respect, than they should act like gods

>really sweet domains
She allows her followers to conjure hats?

>What benefits?
Longer life span (yep, it has been scientifically proven that religious people live longer than nonreligious people of similar means), increased likelihood of finding a good wife, a cozy and supportive social group, and cleansing of your sins, transformation of your character, and everlasting life.

Not to mention, most of the afterlives they promise are pretty shitty. If a soul exists for sure in your setting and there's a multitude of gods, what makes you think they're in any way directly needed for afterlife?

The direct connection between god, afterlife and soul is easy in monotheism. It sure isn't in polytheism.

For my setting, I had it that the gods while present, are fairly inscrutable. IE their desires are inconsistent and often taxing. The people that don't worship are the ones that literally lack faith, as in they're not willing to put in a bunch of work for maybe a chance at divine grace.

>it has been scientifically proven that religious people live longer than nonreligious people of similar means
Do this "scientifical proofs" take into account the 1.1 billion sharia law follwers?

Well presumably it wasn't done on animals

>Country with longest life span is Japan
>60% of Japan is non religious
Kay

As a lesbian the increased likelihood of finding a good wife and supportive social group appeals to me, where do I sign up?

>Unitarian Universalism
They had openly gay clergy in the 70s.

Add to that in 3rd world countries those with highest % of religious people are those with shortest life span

But if you believe for the social benefits, that's not faith.

Is it suddenly faith if you believe for the overt supernatural benefits?

Look at this fool, thinking that most people who go to church on Sunday and participate in rituals have "faith". It's a free social club that gives you great societal benefits, and an automatic boost to reputation.

The reason why the majority of atheists are angry losers is because they're autistic and they don't understand how to integrate in society.

What if there is a god or goddess who demands her followers mostly observe her, not by being her priests but by being good fighters?
Essentially 99% of her followers are just people that lift and train and gain and the few priests are the ones who oversee the yearly competitions and make some superficial prayers and lead the others in times of crises in exchange for some divine lightning and buff spells?
Cuz that's a religion in my setting
There's another goddess who has two types of followers, artists/creators, and the clerics who hunt werewolves and zombies
basically every religion has a following of people who don't get powers and the special clergy who does
being religious =/= being a priest
also some people just like to steal, and I haven't invented a god of stealing yet

This is a very specific requirement for a religious pantheon. Not many polytheistic religions require you to be devout (rather than just please them at specific times).

Married?

The thing that perplexes me about these threads is that, for them to exist, you have to choose to interpret fiction in the least sensible way. Of course if paying 15 minutes of lip service to a deity is enough to get you blessings it would be stupid not to do it. The fact that not everyone spends 15 minutes a day praying and that not everyone is getting blessings all day should be evidence that it's not that easy. Do you really think you're that much smarter than everyone else? That you've discovered some great loophole that has gone overlooked for decades? Or maybe, just maybe, could it be that you're barking up the wrong tree?

Blame it on bad DMs who have dozens of level 1-3 clerics in a tiny temple in a tiny village, instead of maybe 1 adept/expert priest with focus on religious dogma and rituals.

Marriage is up to the government as it should be, it's a legally binding contract that involves the state.

If you wanted to have a symbolic religious marriage, you could do it in your backyard at any point in time ever.

>not wanting to bust two mythic nuts a month

Ah. So most religious people are false worshippers who exploit the church for their own gain.

Doesn't really seem like a social club you'd want to join...

If just praying grants you powers the silly ones are Clerics, Paladins, Oracles, Inquisitors, etc who have to sacrifice their entire lives to the cause not being able to have anything else in mind than serving their God. Kek, you only need 5 min of praying a day, what a loser

There isn't a clear dichotomy between false and true. Plenty of mostly law abiding contributing members of society bitch about taxes, other people and laws all the time, it doesn't make them disgusting crust punks and anarchists.

>Look at this fool, thinking that most people who go to church on Sunday and participate in rituals have "faith". It's a free social club that gives you great societal benefits, and an automatic boost to reputation.

You literally said that most religious people don't have faith, and go to church for societal benefits. Do they have faith or not?

The majority of atheists integrate into society just fine because they live somewhere religion isn't the only pillar of the community. The only reason most atheists even have a reason to talk about their atheism is when some religious movement is disrupting their community, like when they protest a Planned Parenthood or whatever.

Because religion in most fantasy settings isn't anything like religion in the real world. The gods generally aren't presented as the sole agents of fate, merely extremely powerful actors within the grand scheme of things. There are other sources of power that don't involve dedicating yourself to a being that is limited in scope for narrative reasons.

Too true...

If the class names weren't sacred cows at this point, they really ought to have just changed cleric to prophet.

As far as D&D goes, the black truth of the demon lord Sertrous confirms you just need to have great faith to earn divine powers, it doesn't have to be faith to an individual. There are thusly clerics of War, of Light, of the Earth, etc.
You can be a heretic omni-atheist and still get cleric powers, if your faith in whatever non-god concept is mighty enough.

You obviously have to compare irreligious and religious people in the same country to get any meaningful data. Comparing all religious and all irreligious people worldwide is dumb because it doesn't take into account regional living standards. I'm personally agnostic but it's a fact that religious people live longer on average all other things being equal. (presumably because they are part of a local community and support structure that's looking out for them, not to mention the happiness that faith can bring)

If there are gods people consider "good" then there are also gods for the assholes.

See the elder scrolls. there is a god there for every kind of person.

There's no distinction between gods and religion, if gods are real.

This really depends on local cultural context. There are a lot of places where the church is the only social club in town, so the believers are in the majority by necessity because being outside the church makes you a bit of an outcast.

For example, not all small town Christian communities in the American South are full of crazy fundies despite what you may have been lead to believe. Old school, non-redneck Southern culture has a strong aspect of "face" not unlike what you have in some Asian cultures. E.g.: The youngest son of a prominent family might go out drinking and whoring every weekend but nobody really acknowledges it as long as it stays under wraps because that would damage the image of the rest of the family.

In that context being a good Christian is the honor code you judge face by, so everyone goes to church by default even if you are a non-believer. For a significant portion of the community you really do just go to church for purely social reasons.

From another perspective, a friend of mine grew up in the Australian Anglican church and says they took it being a social circle to an extreme, to the point that talking about God and Jesus like a fundamentalist would is rude. She summarized the general attitude as something along the lines of "Oh, God may or may not exist, but the important thing is I have to cook for the church potluck tomorrow!"

In my setting you can get divine powers by praying for 15 minutes every day, but only after you've done so for 20 years without missing a day. And you lose them if you miss a day, too.
So to answer your question, OP, some people haven't done their twenty years yet or they forgot to.

Well there's organized religion vs. solitary worship.

What if I pray for an hour a day for 5 years?

That's a smitin'

These gods are assholes. Such huge assholes so you wouldn't even want to have eternal afterlife if it means eternity with these jerks.

The gods are not our friends. They do not care about us. At best, we are pawns in their games. At worst, we are cattle to be slaughtered at their whim.

To claim that the gods love us is to claim that a man can love the fleas upon his dog.

In my setting, the gods are very vain and unlikeable due to their neglegence of the wishes of those who aren't in their grand plan. One God let an entire city fall to a demon because he knew he wouldn't with the fight without great losses in his angels. So some see them as selfish with their power.