Religion as the Counterbalance to Massmindedness

The gem of this section is Jung’s distinction between religion and creed. The former is an intensely subjective relationship to God or salvation or liberation—“extramundane factors.” In contrast, creed involves an institution or community (a mass of people) and is of this world. State governments and religious organizations subsume the authority of religion (proper) to promote allegiance and support for themselves. Hence, the state will draw upon the magic of ceremony, pomp, mystery, pageantry, processions, etc. to increase its power.

All this seems apparent, especially in light of the Fascist propaganda machines of the twentieth century. Think of the monumental portrait art of state leaders, like Chairman Mao. What I like the most here bears resemblance to a piece of the first section. Jung writes: “…a natural function which has existed from the beginning, like the religious function, cannot be disposed of with rationalistic and so-called enlightened criticism.”

I wrote about this in my first post. To combat the state’s use of creed, it is not enough to point out contradictions and irrationalities. One would need a whole system to win the confidence of the masses. But then this would be just another dogma for the people to swallow without chewing.

Zo, is this the only answer?