Memetic Mutation

I am always surprised by the extant to which a religion can change without any alteration of the original source material.  I understand that evolution with the social structures of the time are vital for any religion that wants to survive past the nascent cult stage and become self perpetuating, but what tends to stand out most in my mind is the forced evolution undergoes when it is being twisted towards a political end.

Back towards the beginning of the course we talked about how religion is one of a number of categories (along with politics, nationality, and economic status) by which people order their lives to varying degrees of adherence.  In our modern society we strive to keep these circles separate, or at least we used to.   There was a time in the past when they overlapped considerably more, a time which is starting again as which are primarily economic in nature are being cast in a religious light.  The occupation and attempted liberation of Ireland, the war in the Middle East, etc.  Religion overlaps with political and social life so thoroughly that any alteration in them first requires an alteration to the overlaying religion.  It is from this process that the Crusades and the Jihad of the Sword were unleashed upon the world. (I will not attempt to categorize or define the various types of Jihad here but suffice to say that jihad can be both an external physical struggle and an internal spiritual one).  Most religions emphasis peace and harmony (they have to, in order to be able to provide a functional basis for society) but once they are the social norm they inevitably start to spit out warriors.

The dangerous thing to my mind about all of these situations is that they create feedback loops.  Politics in influenced by religion, which in turn is altered to fit political needs and both of them warp society correspondingly.

Where will it all end I wonder?