This article will serve as a basic introduction to the terminology and language around religion and spirituality in Common, as well as a brief introduction to the status and state of major religions within New World Order territory. We will mainly consider major world religions, but also look at systems of beliefs that are arguably philosophies but contain supernatural elements, and less formally organised spirituality. The New World Order may be an atheist global state that deprecates all forms of spirituality, but religion remains a potent force in the world today. Travellers to the NWO-controlled territories need to understand the status of religion in order to navigate that society safely.

For the benefit of British readers who may wish to visit the other Free States, or people living under NWO rule who may want accurate information about the status of religion in the Free States, we will also compare and contrast the status of religions in the NWO to that in the Free States.

General Status of Religion in the NWO

In the early 21th century, religion enjoyed a high degree of support at the government level. In the old United States, while the Constitution mandated separation of church and state, society was very religious (American society mostly consisting of different Christian denominations) and politicians were often very explicitly religious. Being non-religious or atheist was virtually disqualifying to public life. This played out similarly in most countries, with northern European countries the most tolerant of non-belief and Muslim countries generally the least. The big exception was China, which was much like the NWO is today and which provided the model that was copied for the modern state's approach to religion.

The NWO is accused of being officially atheist, and while this isn't quite true, the NWO is 'not officially atheist' in the way that English 'wasn't the official language' of the United States until the ratification of the 28th Amendment to the Constitution in 2025 under President Donald Trump Jr. made English the official language (and Christianity the official religion) of the United States. It is true for all practical intents and purposes.

Religion and spirituality aren't banned by the New World Order, but they are regarded with disdain and fear. The New World Order looks upon religion, especially universalist religions like Christianity and Islam, as rival globalising ideologies, and as such views them with suspicion and some degree of hostility as direct rivals. It sees these faiths as working at cross purposes to the Order in many ways.

The New World Order's approach to this perceived threat is to restrict the legal practice of religion to specially sanctioned Globalist churches, mosques, etc., and to infiltrate and bully religious organisations into complicity. At the same time, it deprecates and demeans religious worship. Membership in a church can lead to discrimination and economic disadvantage. Non-sanctioned religious practice is closely watched and often severely harassed by the authorities. As such, many religious people worship in secret in private homes rather than in large, organised churches and congregations.

Spiritual practices such as astrology, divination, village witchcraft and various pseudoscientific healing techniques, however, while officially denounced as charlatanism, are much more accepted by the NWO and practitioners operate very freely, even with members of the elites as clients.

In general, the level of religious belief tends to go down the farther up you go in society, also correlating with level of education. We have direct evidence that there are secret Christians and Muslims even amongst the elites. The elite society as a whole is protective of its members, but religion is viewed as anti-Globalist, subversive behaviour. Religion amongst the elites, when discovered, is hushed up if possible and stamped out if necessary. Elites who practice religion tend to do so discreetly.

Christianity

The NWO has a number of state-sanctioned churches, including its own version of the Roman Catholic Church - basically, a coterie of collaborationist Cardinals and Bishops who failed to escape to Quebec and who rejected martyrdom, and the sham Antipope they appointed. The real Holy See is in Quebec City, where Pope Pius XIII and many of his Cardinals fled the NWO and where Pope Benedict XVII currently sits. There are also several registered Protestant denominations.

During the Global Collapse, extremist Christian terrorism reached very high levels of cruelty and violence. Of course, millions of other Christians, the vast majority, continued to heed the message of peace. Nevertheless, Christianity was and remains a potent source of opposition to the New World Order, with Christian insurgent groups continuing to attack critical infrastructure, to carry out terrorist attacks and to brutalise villagers in the countryside in an effort to discredit the NWO.

As such, any profession of Christian belief is watched closely by the authorities. British citizens travelling in NWO territories are advised for their own safety to avoid open display of Christian symbols, and to keep Christian worship strictly private.

In the Free States, Christianity is practised freely in Britain, where the majority affiliate with the Church of England (albeit often very loosely), and in Quebec, where the true Holy See is located and where Roman Catholicism is the dominant religion and the only one officially recognised. Quebec does not practice separation of church and state, either in an official sense like the old United States, or de facto like modern Britain, and Pope Benedict (or Pape Benoît, himself a 'pure laine' Québecois) is a highly influential political figure.

Islam

The status of Islam is similar to that of Christianity, except that Islam doesn't have sanctioned large-scale umbrella organisations in quite the same way that Christianity does, which makes it harder for licit Islam to function, and Islam suffers from a much more negative reaction from the authorities. The most prosperous and stable Muslim-majority country today is storm-battered Indonesia. Much of the Muslim world is located in the global South and in south and south-west Asia, where it has been devastated by global warming (especially desertification and loss of water supplies), and conventional and nuclear war.

Similar to Christianity, while the vast majority of Muslims are peaceful, a large amount of global insurgency and terrorism is driven by Islamic ideology. Muslim terrorists and guerrillas employ much the same brutal tactics as Christian terrorists, and although their rhetoric is different, the outcomes are similar. Muslim insurgency goes back farther, though, to well before the collapse of the United States, and although modern Islamic insurgents are arguably more violent now than they were in the early 21st century, there is nothing about them that makes them particularly stand out from the Christian variety.

However, the NWO has much more history with facing Islamic fighters on the battlefield, in the aftermath of the Middle East War, and also due to the war, has little in the way of influential Muslim-majority states which might harbour some elite sympathy to Muslims the way such attitudes exist for Christians. Even na Turkije, a Muslim-majority country and one of the founding NWO states, was ruled by a secular military dictatorship at the time of accession and has an anti-religious bent.

The NWO does not make any distinction between Shia and Sunni Islam in its treatment of Muslims.

Islam as a minority religion is found globally. It is practised freely and openly in Britain, where it is an important minority religion, and is found in Quebec, where it is repressed in much the manner that it is in NWO territory.

The Hajj

The Hajj, or the pilgrimage to the city of Mecca in Arabia that all Muslims who are physically and financially able used to be required to undertake at last once in their lifetimes, is one of the Five Pillars of Islam. It used to be conducted during the last month of the Islamic lunar calendar of Dhu al-Hijjah.

However, it has not been possible to complete the Hajj since the Middle East War in 2047. During the war, Mecca received a direct hit from one or more nuclear warheads. Following the war, the New World Order placed an interdiction on the lands around Mecca, ostensibly for safety. It is illegal for any except NWO security forces to enter the interdiction zone. The region today is a blistering, uninhabited desert filled with ruins and patrolled by drones. If anyone has completed the Hajj in the last seventy years, they did it in secret. It would not be possible to complete the rituals there in the traditional way. It seems unlikely that the Kaaba even still exists. 

From what I understand, Muslims around the world differ in their approach to this new reality, but that fundamentally, since Muslims are only required to undertake the Hajj on the basis of ability, the high level of difficulty excuses believers from the obligation in the current age.

Buddhism and Confucianism

These are treated together, because together they form the majority belief systems of the Chinese states. Buddhists operate largely with impunity in the NWO, as long as their temples and monasteries are registered with the authorities and express allegiance to Globalist principles. These belief systems have supernatural components, but were popular with the Chinese NWO elite and have spread to the elite of other states through the NWO's system of elite intermarriage. They are relatively popular and not framed as superstitious or subversive. The majority of elites who do not espouse these beliefs still tend to respect them.

Buddhism is also freely practised in the Free States of South Korea and Japan, and of course there are a small but significant number of Buddhists in Britain as well, who sadly are regarded with a degree of suspicion by many other Britons. British Buddhists are somewhat important in Britain's unofficial contacts with the New World Order, as British Buddhist organisations are able to have relatively open ties to their counterparts in the New World Order due to the NWO's relative friendliness to Buddhism.

Weism

A popular offshoot of Buddhism in the New World Order is Weism, a religion founded in modern times by an Epekwitys former Buddhist monk in Cascadia. Weism is more a religion of the urban professional class, but is popular globally and widely tolerated by the elites. Weism is thoroughly decentralised but ideologically highly sympathetic to Globalism. However, Weists face official discrimination in areas with a strong Buddhist presence, as they are not well-liked by proper Buddhists, and can also be particularly targeted by religiously-motivated trols. See the attached article on founder Paul Wei for details.

Hinduism

The NWO tends to have a very negative and oppressive stance towards Hinduism because of its perceived ethno-nationalistic bent that goes directly against the Globalist 'na ate Atuinysyn', 'One People' principle. It is generally viewed as tawdry and primitive superstition. All major Hindu temples have been repurposed as museums and heritage sites and are not permitted to be used for worship. No organised Hindu religion is sanctioned. All Hindu practice is informal and underground.

There is heavy resistance against the suppression of Hinduism in India, and both Hindu and Muslim beliefs are important drivers of violence and insurgency in India - with the complication that the two sides do not solely focus their attacks on the New World Order, but expend a lot of energy attacking each other as well.

However, Hinduism remains very popular and is common worldwide, with all the shifting of populations that has occurred, and in fact Hindu beliefs have spread and become very influential among other groups in areas where a lot of Indians have settled. Hinduism is an important minority religion in Britain, where it is practised freely. The small Hindu minority in Quebec experiences severe discrimination, where Hinduism is currently viewed as a pagan religion by the Church.

Judaism

Judaism has an interesting relationship with the NWO. The New World Order's main early nationalist opponents tended to be very anti-Semitic. At the same time, a number of notable Jewish people were early and influential supporters of Globalism, which led to early attacks on the Globalist movement having a very anti-Semitic character. As such, the early Globalist movement, ever one to deliberately goad its opponents, played up its association with Judaism, which in turn helped drive attacks on innocent Jewish bystanders.

That relationship eventually soured once the Globalist movement arrived and the New World Order was established, for a few reasons.

For one, the Jewish people who were Globalist tended to be less religious Jews to begin with and tended to invest more of their identity in their Globalism than in their Judaism. So there wasn't necessarily a great deal of tolerance for Jewish faith pre-existing in Globalism.

For another thing, the Middle East War happened, which started with a nuclear exchange between Israel and Arabia, and ended at least one billion deaths later with Israel surrounded in its current double wall and embargoed by the NWO. This created a very uncomfortable situation for Jewish Globalists.

So too, did the evolving Globalist elite custom of intermarriage and disrespect for the preservation of ethnic identity. Even if Jewish Globalist elites were on the whole not very religious, they tended to have more desire to preserve Jewish culture and some (but certainly not all) resisted assimilation.

At the elite level, some people of Jewish background are thoroughly assimilated and intermixed, with some small survival of Jewish practices as family traditions - such elites function with no detriment. Others have tried to preserve their Jewishness and have found themselves increasingly alienated from the rest of elite society and facing discrimination. However, they have not been cast out yet and remain reluctantly tolerated.

At lower levels, ethnic preservation is certainly not encouraged anywhere in the NWO, but the NWO retains a grudging soft spot for Judaism, so Jewish society does persist in pockets, and synagogues are permitted to operate without harassment if they register with the authorities and refrain from challenging Globalism. However, Judaism is struggling, as it deals with the challenges of navigating state repression and managing the enormous strains brought to bear by the Global Collapse.

Anti-semitism certainly does exist in Britain, but as Prime Minister Charles Cohen, himself Jewish, can certainly attest, Britain is probably the safest and most nurturing refuge for the Jewish people and faith today. Quebec is reputed to be very anti-Semitic but to still retain a Jewish community. Israel is thought to be 100% Jewish and under the rule of religious extremists, but the irradiated and dessicated terrain is a harsh refuge, even with the rebuilt Temple in Jerusalem.

Atheism

While not a religion, atheism as a stance on the topic of religion or as an identity deserves some mention. Atheism is the most prestigious stance on belief in the NWO. Maybe a majority of people are atheistic, but this is hard to define, because many people with no religious practice or real religious beliefs may hold on to various superstitions and pseudoscience, which they may frame as science.

Within the elite, pure scientific atheism is the most respectable belief system. They would not likely even think to identify themselves as 'atheist' - if pushed, they might patronisingly say they don't believe in any superstitious nonsense.

At lower levels of society, atheists can face discrimination and hostility from their neighbours, both for the normal reasons of communal solidarity that drives hostility towards all apostates, and also because atheism may be seen as collaboration with the authorities and social climbing. The NWO responds very swiftly and harshly to attacks on atheists, however.

In contrast to Britain, where atheism is tolerated but viewed with a degree of suspicion and is not good for success in public life, in the NWO, atheism is especially well-regarded and especially qualifying for public life. Atheism is a felony crime in Quebec, viewed as aggravated blasphemy and punished very severely. When visiting Quebec, it may be wise to play up your Christian beliefs. The status of atheism in South Korea, Japan and Israel is not known.

Other Religions

There is much more we can say about the above faiths, and many others, but we will finish off this section with just a few words about the status of other major religions. Sikhism is oppressed, being treated in a broadly comparable way to Christianity but possibly a bit worse. The Baha'i faith generally takes a peaceful stance with the NWO and complies with its requirements, and is generally tolerated better than Christianity but not nearly as well as Buddhism. It may actually be spreading. Animistic religions generally are patronised and dismissed as superstition and fly under the radar.

Common-Language Religious and Spiritual Vocabulary

The Common language natively has an impoverished vocabulary for spiritual matters. The original Hillbillies screenshow did not portray the futuristic society that spoke Common as especially religious, and Peter K. Davidson didn't have to make up much vocabulary in this area for the show. The original fan base had a significant intersection with the early, not-very-religious Globalist movement which did not place any particular demand for Davidson to make vocabulary in this area. There were early fan efforts, but they never took.

A small handful of native words exist, either directly coined for this area, like 'ny kiput', a god or God, or else repurposed like 'fures', 'spiritual', from 'fure', 'wind'. Much of the rest is borrowed, especially concepts specific to certain religions.

There is a strong tendency for religions to operate and worship in 'folk languages', especially in the case of Islam, which is intimately tied to Classical Arabic. However, some religions do have translations of their holy books into Common and have some Common-language terminology, to demonstrate a desire to comply with the authorities to avoid sanctions, to proselytise to Common-speaking people, or for the practical fact that it's just the main lingua franca that most people have to engage with every day.

Many Christians are serious about proselytising to Common-speakers and a few complete Common Bible translations have been made from the original languages. A wide array of Common-language materials exist - it is possible to have Christian worship in some denominations completely in Common. An extensive amount of Buddhist materials have been translated into Common, there is a corpus of original Buddhist literature in Common, and Buddhism is the most thoroughly assimilated religion into Common. Common is the actual native language of Weism. Muslims, on the other hand, generally refuse to engage with Common.

No matter what the religion, NWO academics study religion as an academic topic, and the security forces closely study it as well on the principle of 'know thine enemy', so the NWO has academic translations of every important religious work into Common. These are not generally available to the public.

General Terminology

The table below gives some basic words applicable to all religion and spirtuality.

Christianity and Judaism

The table below translates a few uniquely Christian or Jewish concepts. Christianity is one of the most well-represented religions in Common, as there exist a wide range of non-publicly-available academic translations of important Christian works, as well as a plethora of translations and novel literature created directly for Christians for preaching to Common-speakers. Judaism, in contrast, has markedly less in the way of Common-language materials and shares some terminology with Christianity.

Islam

The table below gives a few terms specific to Islam. The quality and amount of publicly-available Common-language materials about Islam is poor. As you can see, vocabulary to discuss Islam is more heavily borrowed than was the case for Christianity and Judaism, which used more in the way of Common expressions ('na zra Fehet') and derivations ('-fisa')..

Buddhism and Weism

The sample below gives a few Common terms specific to Buddhism and its offshoot Weism. Buddhism and Weism have a high-quality and publicly-accessible literature in Common, both translated and novel.

Note the word for a Buddhist person is 'ny Budasynka'. If Buddhism followed the more familiar pattern of other religions, it would be Budafisaka, or roughly, 'Buddha-belief-experiencer'. Instead it is Budasynka, or 'Buda-like-state-experiencer'. This framing may be due to the relatively positive position Buddhism enjoys with the New World Order. Avoiding '-fisa' avoids apparent competition with 'Onpafisa', or Globalism, and the derivation seems to cast Buddhists in a somewhat more complimentary light.