Calling it a religion makes about as much sense as calling efforts to cure AIDS or vaccinate Polio prior to the success of Salk a religion. There is a clear and obvious good to achieve, one which is theoretically implementatable and has predecessors for success. Reality can only disagree if it is outright proven impossible due to something - say in this counterfactual Polio has a 5% of turning any unique adjacent molecule it into more polio. otherwise they are literally Just like how taking the spit of a polio patient and putting it in saline with a sprig of mint will spread instead of vaccinating but it doesn't prove a polio vaccine is impossible because "we tried and people got sick".

It is clearly a goal and a realistic one within even a few decades pessimisitcally given that its ability is creeping upwards.