Jerry makes an interesting point -- the two have many ingredients in common, but the worship of Paris Hilton has no comfort in it and no enduring guidelines to pass on. The merit of Christianity or Islam is in whatever degree of wisdom it imparts. That's true of any belief system--to the degree it provides some kind of wisdom-in-use, it has worth. By providing a model of the universe, no matter how unwieldy that model might seem to outsiders, a religion provides some template as a ward against the painful confusions of life. IF the template provides guidance in decisions which actually helps, all the more power to it.

Mass immersion in events provides a similar sort of comfort, but it is not the comfort of wisdom or even of warding off confusion with arbitrary belief -- it is the comfort of hiding out in large numbers, which frees you of responsibility. Your responsibility in a crowd changes from "seeing, analyzing, deciding and communicating" to merely "reacting as the crowd reacts". A much easier role.

WHat mystifies me is those who take a body of data (such as Christianity) or the Koran, meant to sustain life and life's purposes, and use it to dramatize psychotic bigotry and hatefulness, which are things which poison life and suppress it.