It happened with Mormonism in the 1800's. They've done such a good job integrating the made up mormonism image into being accepted as a "real religion" culturally that I'll probably get flagged for this. Truth is, some charismatic dude just made it up. In 50 years, discussion boards will probably flag people for dissing Scientology.

EDIT: As pointed out below, the term "real religion" just means one that has lasted to this day with a substantial enough following to obtain protected status.

I mean, arguably, a real religion is just one which hangs around for a while. Typically, in the process, losing its weirdest elements; early Mormonism, and Christianity for that matter, had many strange elements that are today have become niche or been entirely abandoned (few modern Mormons are polygamists, and proportionally even fewer modern Christians are religious vegetarians, say).

When I was a kid in a christian household I asked how come there were no supernatural things happening today like the stories in the bible. I got the idea it was not good to ask impertinent questions like that. Later I started to be more skeptical. People just believe things with no evidence (often heard when they were young), whether its the story of angels and demons in the bible or the ideas in scientology about aliens. But the thing I noticed is people usually believe the things they learned as a kid, but are really skeptical of other religion's bizarre or supernatural claims of magical things happening. The part that is missing (in some people as adults) is applying some of that skepticism to their own religion.

So what's happening when an adult accepts a new religion that makes them accept a new set of supernatural 'facts'? I always wondered about that process.

Well, for the really established religions, all the supernatural things happened 1400+ years ago.

Mormonism, on the other hand, was only 180 years ago. For some reason, that makes their supernatural stuff a little harder to accept.

> Well, for the really established religions, all the supernatural things happened 1400+ years ago.

For many branches of Christianity, miracles continue to happen! Of course, most Christians likely don't _literally_ believe in miracles.

The Charismatic Christians still speak in tongues and lay on hands. Althought given what I've seen in the past 4 years with Flat Earth, Q, and AntiVax, that's no longer crazy IMHO.

One proposal is that religion is the cargo cult built around the fossil of a once-living system that worked or was relevant for a particular time, place, and group of people.

So in the case of Scientology, perhaps there was a set of techniques that worked for one reason or another, and people still swarm around the dead husk - the empty rituals. The why is obvious; control and greed. Two things that are almost guaranteed to kill something delicate and living.

Good point. There are a lot fewer stonings in Christianity today than in the past.