ABSTRACT
It might be worthwhile one day to examine why it was that intellectuals (myself included) could so blind themselves to the self-evident durability of religion and its continuing importance for human culture-no matter how modernized. Yet, as Mary Douglas (1983) has noted, recent religious trends even took scholars of religion by surprise. Surely they at least should have been sensitive to the unique capacities of religions to answer the most fundamental questions of human meaning. As I have stressed at length elsewhere (Stark and Bainbridge 1980, 1985), to deny that the universe has purpose is not the same thing as giving an answer to the question: What is the meaning of the universe? It will be evident that only by assuming the existence of the supernatural is it possible to say that the universe does have a purpose. Hence, so long as people persist in wanting certain kinds of answers (or certain kinds of rewards such as life beyond death) religion almost must persist.
