Scam Religion: Difference between revisions

Often a [[Parody Religion]]. See also [[Church of Happyology]] and [[God Guise]]. Contrast [[Path of Inspiration]], where the cult members are [[Obliviously Evil]] [[Mook]]s of some kind of [[Evil Overlord]] or [[Ancient Conspiracy]], and [[Scary Amoral Religion]], which leads its followers into depravity.

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{{examples}}

== 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]].

== 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 (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 ==

* ''[[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 A Strange Land]]''.

* Fighting a scam religion forms the main plots of books eight and nine of ''[[Ranger's Apprentice]].''

* 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 and Order]]'' ''[[Special Victims Unit]]'' the SVU team take on a cult leader, who brainwashes women into his cult by making them his wives so he can get access to their bank accounts.

== 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.

== Theatre ==

* The Rhythm of Life Church in the musical ''[[Sweet Charity]]''. It was supposedly founded at the urging of a mysterious Voice:

{{quote|And the voice said, "Brother, there's a million pigeons

== Video Games ==

* ''[[Fall From Heaven]]'' has a spirit magic user in the backstory who regularly did this.

* ''[[Fable|Fable II]]'' features [[Fun with Acronyms|T.O.B.Y.]], the Temple of Business and Yodeling, also known as the Temple of Benevolent Yokels. A quest in Bloodstone involves you running errands for the founder, Toby, but you eventually find out it's just a front for Toby to find suckers he can con into buying useless crap or running errands for him.

{{quote|'''Minato''': You're scamming them, too?}}

* 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]]'' (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]].

[[Category:Sociology Tropes]]

[[Category:Religion Tropes]]

[[Category:Empowerment]]

[[Category:No Real Life Examples, Please]]