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In a [[Kitchen Sink Drama|Low Magic World]], a Scam Religion typically has no power at all. In a [[Heroic Fantasy|High Magic World]], it will have power — but its power will be empty, inferior, low level. Arcane tricks rather than true divine miracles.
Often a [[Parody Religion]]. See also [[Church of Happyology]] and [[God Guise]]. Contrast [[Path of Inspiration]], where the cult members are [[Obliviously Evil]] [[Mook
'''NOTE:''' Only add examples that can be objectively verified to be scams according to the narrative. Thus, '''[[No Real Life Examples Please|NO Real Life examples]]''', since we can't see our world from the outside. That includes any religion that ''you'' personally consider to be a scam, no matter what evidence you have or how large majority of mankind agrees with you. If you think this trope is being ''[[Invoked Trope|invoked]]'' in real life, it's probably a [[Parody Religion]].▼
{{examples|Examples}}▼
'''NOTE:''' Only add examples that can be objectively verified to be scams ''according to the narrative''.
== Anime and Manga ==▼
▲
▲== [[Anime]] and [[Manga]] ==
* ''[[Fullmetal Alchemist]]'': The Church of Leto, led by [[Sinister Minister|Father Cornello]], who gathers followers in Lior by convincing them he can do amazing miracles with power given to him by the sun god, Leto. In reality he's just a regular alchemist (and not even a particularly talented one), albeit one with a Philosopher's Stone that enhances his alchemy. Edward uncovers the scam very early on in the manga. Much, ''much'' later, we find out he was going to [[Life Energy|use his follower's souls]] as part of the [[Gambit Pileup]] orchestrated by the [[Big Bad]].
** It's implied that the Ishvalan religion was invented by {{spoiler|Father}} in order to have an easy genocide target when the time came. Of course, its also implied that this god intervened in the fight between {{spoiler|Wrath}} and Scar, blinding the former with a ray of light at a key moment, so [[Maybe Magic, Maybe Mundane|who knows]].
* ''[[The Tatami Galaxy]]'' has a combination religion/pyramid scheme.
== [[Comic Books]] ==
* ''[[Fables]]'': in The Great Fables Crossover, [[Unwanted False Faith|the belief in Blue Boy]] temporarily turns into this as Jack takes over as its shepherd.
== [[Film]] ==
* In ''[[Leap of Faith (
▲* In ''[[Leap of Faith (Film)|Leap of Faith]]'', [[Steve Martin]]'s character is a self-confessed [[Con Man]] who sees religion simply as a way to scam the people who attend his revival meetings. However, he's forced to rethink his views on religion when {{spoiler|the people's faith starts resulting in actual miracles.}}
== Literature ==▼
▲== [[Literature]] ==
* ''[[The Chronicles of Narnia]]'': The seventh book features a monkey trickster who makes people believe in a fake Aslan that is really a donkey in a cheap lion costume.
* <s>Scientology?</s> Nothing to see here. There's Fosterism in ''[[Stranger in
** Ironically, though Fosterism was founded by scam artists looking to get paid (and laid) by gullible people, their Supreme Bishops
* Bokononism in ''[[
* Hillman Hunter of ''[[The
* In the ''[[
* The book ''Leaving Fishers'' by Margaret Peterson Haddix is about a girl who joins a cult called Fishers of Men. Among the many other things wrong with it, one thing she finds out at the end {{spoiler|when she de-converts}} is that the head of the cult is using their donations to support a lavish lifestyle, while making it out as though he can barely afford things. {{spoiler|The main character admits to having given the cult her college savings...}}
* In ''[[
* Fighting a scam religion forms the main plots of books eight and nine of ''[[
== Live Action TV ==▼
* The ''[[Sliders]]'' episode "Prophets and Loss" has a fundamentalist church which "sends its believers to paradise" with what the protagonists think is Sliding technology {{spoiler|but is actually a human incinerator}}.
* ''[[Law
** If it's the same case I'm thinking of, said cult leader also brainwashed married women ''and'' their husbands into becoming part of the cult. Then he'd secretly kill off the husbands and convince the wives that the guys had abandoned them, thus
* ''[[Stargate SG
== Radio ==▼
▲== [[Radio]] ==
* [[Hudson and Landry]]'s "Fredrickism" skit; involving the worship of creator Freddie Schultz, obeying the 26 Commandments grants you immortality, and under investigation by the IRS.
== [[Tabletop Games]] ==
* ''[[Transhuman Space]]'', with its memetic science, has several bizarre religions, most of which are at least partly engineered. Some of them are genuine, at least one [[Unwanted False Faith|started as a joke that got out of hand]], and then there's things like Ecoherence, which is pretty close to being an eviromentalism-themed [[Church of Happyology]], carefully designed to create "self-reinforcing cycles of dependency", and charging for brain-scans to judge how "coherent" its followers are. And the Unified Way, which was created ''[[Path of Inspiration|as a weapon]]''.
* ''[[Dragonlance]]'' had the Seekers, who used the void left after the gods abandoned the world in the wake of the Cataclysm to seize power by peddling false religion.
* ''[[Pathfinder]]'' features the Church of the Living God, a [[Cult]] run by a man in [[God Guise]] who employs mages disguised as priests to enforce his will.
* ''[[
* ''[[Dungeons and Dragons]]''
** The classic adventure ''[[The Temple of Elemental Evil]]'' was this twice-over. Most cultists believed they were simply worshiping the destructive powers of the elements. However, it was actually a ruse by the demon lord Zuggtmoy, who designed the ruse in order to better recruit worshipers and gain power; few mortals worshiped her directly, because a goddess of fungus isn't all-too appealing. {{spoiler|However, only a very small inner circle of the cult knew that Zuggtmoy was also being played by a sucker by the true focus of the Temple, [[The Man Behind the Man| the mad god of destruction, Tharizdun.]]}}
== Theatre ==▼
** Many cultists who worship the demon lord Fraz-Urb'luu have been duped into doing so, believing they are worshipping some other demon, Elder Evil, ancient god, or even celestial being. This is hardly surprising, seeing as Fraz-Urb'luu is a [[Master of Illusion]] who is known as the Prince of Deception.
* The cult of the god Zhakata in the realm of G'Henna, from the ''[[Ravenloft]]'' setting is one of the worst examples of this trope in RPGs (possibly the worst example ''period''). Zhakata is a god of famine and most of the food produced in the realm is sacrificed to him (and actually eaten by the [[Corrupt Church| corrupt priesthood]], naturally). His worship involves voluntary human sacrifice via starvation, among other such pleasant things. Worshippers hope that their sacrifice will mean that Zhakata will transform from his evil Devourer aspect to his benevolent Provider aspect, and reward them with an era of bounty. The thing is, even in-universe ''Zhakhata isn't real'' (Ravenloft itself grants spells to the cult's leaders), so people are killing themselves for no reason in hope that a fictional savior will come. Zhakhata is actually a delusion of Yagno Petrovna, the high priest. Yagno is aware on some level that his god doesn't really exist, and part of the [[Ironic Hell]] he has to suffer as a Darklord is living in doubt that his lifelong faith is a sham. Despite this, he [[Ignorant of His Own Ignorance| chooses to continue to delude himself]] and promote Zhakata regardless. This willingness to let people suffer and die for a lie is what keeps Yagno as the Darklord of G'henna.
▲== [[Theatre]] ==
* The Rhythm of Life Church in the musical ''[[Sweet Charity]]''. It was supposedly founded at the urging of a mysterious Voice:
{{quote|
Ready to be hooked on new religions." }}
== [[Video Games]] ==
* ''[[Fall From Heaven]]'' has a spirit magic user in the backstory who regularly did this.
* ''[[Fable|Fable II]]'' features [[Fun
** And hookers. Don't forget the hookers.
** In the first game, the backstory reveals that both Avo the God of Good and Skorm the God of Evil are fakes invented by an enterprising merchant as a way of collecting money from the donations of followers. The scam works because their temples are built over places of very strong naturally occuring magical energy, so the power itself is real, even though the deities themselves are not.
* ''[[Deus Ex: Invisible War
* ''[[Grand Theft Auto Vice City]]'' has Pastor Richards, who is raising money for a Salvation Statue to save himself and his followers from the apocalypse. He admits on the radio his plan to use the statue money to build a mansion in Hawaii.
* ''[[Final Fantasy X]]'' has the Church of Yevon. It teaches that Sin was a divine punishment for using machina, that machina weapons are evil, that Sin will go away with enough prayer and repentance, and that the Final Summoning can free the world from Sin. While it's true from one point of view that machina brought about Sin (Bevelle won the war because of their superior weaponry, and Yu Yevon created Sin as his revenge), they are not inherently evil and Sin is not divine; the church uses this lie to keep the populace under control (no advanced weaponry = harder to overthrow the church). Sin will not go away with any amount of prayer or repentance, and the Final Summoning is actually how Sin is reborn; this lie is used to give the people false hope and keep them ignorant of the true state of things. It's made very clear that the Maesters are fully aware of the continued lies they spread.
** ''[[Final Fantasy X-2]]'' has Neo-Yevon. Despite most of the core concepts of the original clearly having been revealed to be a lie, they exist as a continuation because lie or not, it's all people knew. While they don't try to lie about the original anymore, even if they wanted to, they still adopt most of the trappings of the original and remain enemies of excessive dependency on machina, though they don't pretend they don't fall back on it themselves anymore. {{spoiler|Turns out this is not entirely a scam, in a way at least. While there is nothing wrong with machina in particular, they are still ashamed of Vegnagun, an anti-Sin weapon that went rogue and had to be sealed and they wanted to cover up what a horrific disaster it turned out to be for the ancient predecessors of modern-day Bevelle. Unfortunately, a third party is working to reactivate it despite them wanting to not let it be brought back}}. They also reveal, in a way, the original Yevon, while a scam, was truthfully protecting everyone from something worse: {{spoiler|The original lies they spread were making sure the Farplane was regulated so something far worse, namely Vegnagun, could not be reactivated.}}
* The usual game plan of the [[Big Bad]] of the last four ''[[Ultima]]'' games. The most obvious example is the [[Church of Happyology|Fellowship]] in Britannia, but he pulls the same trick in at least three other worlds to weaken them for conquest. Where he succeeds the scam quickly metamorphoses into a [[Religion of Evil]].
* In ''[[Persona 3]]'', the Moon Social Link for [[Fan Nickname|Minato]] at one point requires a "salvation fee" of 320,000 yen {{spoiler|which you don't actually have to pay.}} You can even later call out the person you share the link with.
{{quote|
== [[Web Comics]] ==
* The Church of Wayne in ''[[Scary Go Round]]'' is really just a con to net money and women for Wayne.
== [[Western Animation]] ==
* Movementarianism from ''[[The Simpsons (animation)|The Simpsons]]'' (which is also Happyology).▼
▲* Movementarianism from ''[[The Simpsons]]'' (which is also Happyology).
* ''[[South Park]]'' has portrayed both Scientology and Mormonism is this way. Ironically, other episodes have shown that Mormons are the only people who get into Heaven, [[Spoof Aesop|so it's not taking itself that seriously]].
** That said, the episode about Mormonism was pretty much entirely "Woah, Mormonism is a load of bull -- but Mormons are the sweetest people on Earth, so who cares?"
* ''[[Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers (
* Sympathetic example: in the ''[[
* In ''[[Prince of Egypt]]'', this is how the Egyptian mythology is portrayed. The High Priests replicate Moses' stick-to-snake miracle, but it's all about creative lighting, ominous statues and chanting, sleight-of-hand tricks and a big helping of showmanship. While Rameses is impressed, he fails to notice that Moses' snake devours the priests' snakes during the [[Villain Song]]. The priests are later exposed when they prove to be utterly useless against the Abrahamic God's ten plagues.
{{reflist}}
[[Category:Sociology Tropes]]
▲[[Category:Empower Ment]]
[[Category:Religion Tropes]]
[[Category:
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