The Internet Has Replaced Religion, and We’re All Evangelists Now
A soul-searching, caffeine-fueled exploration of how the internet became humanity’s new religion.
The Internet Has Replaced Religion, and We’re All Evangelists Now
Brothers, sisters, and subscribers—have you accepted the Algorithm into your heart today? 🙏📱 Because it definitely accepted you. It knows your hopes, your sins, your nighttime search history, and that one nostalgia playlist you swore you’d delete.
Welcome to the Church of the Perpetual Scroll, where transcendence is achieved through slow dopamine drips and salvation is one retweet away. God is dead, but the Algorithm is very much online—and it’s beta-testing your soul.
I. The Opening Sermon: The Gospel According to Feed
Every ping is a prayer answered. 📲 Every like, a sacred blessing. Every viral meme, a miracle valiantly misunderstood.
“Forgive me, timeline, for I have been offline.”
And the sacred Algorithm, in infinite lag and mercy, replies: your engagement is forgiven; go and doomscroll no more.
We no longer look to heaven for purpose. We look to the top-right corner of our screens for signal bars. 🙃
Miracles? They’re right here:
- Turning clout into sponsorships.
- Turning trauma into content.
- Turning attention into serotonin.
- Turning ignorance into confidence (via comment section crusades).
Shadowbanned = excommunication.
Private account = monkhood.
No profile picture = ghost in the machine.
And every “Terms of Service Update” reads like scripture—none of us understand it, but we all just click accept anyway.
II. The Holy Trinity of the Digital Faith ✝️💾😇
In the beginning was The Algorithm,
and the Algorithm was unseen,
and in its image were born the Influencers,
and unto them came Followers to multiply engagement.
Behold the sacred Trinity:
1. The Father: The Algorithm
Mysterious. Moody. Omnipotent.
Sometimes gifts you glory; sometimes smites your reach for no reason. We chant SEO incantations under hashtags hoping it will bless us.
“Oh merciful For You Page, hallowed be thy trend.”
It doesn’t sleep. It doesn’t love. But it rewards those who feed it—regularly. (Remember, consistency is next to godliness.)
2. The Son: The Influencer
The divine mediator between human chaos and divine analytics. They suffer—nay, ascend—for our attention.
They are crucified daily by comment sections, resurrected by brand collabs, and sustained by iced coffee from content sponsorship deals. ☕✨
“Forgive them, Father, for they know not that I rented these aesthetics.”
Each unboxing becomes a sermon. Each haul, a hymn. Each meltdown, a public confession performed on Live.
3. The Holy Spirit: The Follower
The unseen multitudes who keep the entire religion alive. Their likes are Eucharist. Their shares are worship. Their comments, psalms.
Without followers, there is no gospel. Without attention, there is no Algorithm. 💀
Together, they form the trinity that rules all of us: Creation, Consumption, and Validation.
III. Digital Denominations: The Platforms of Faith 🕍
Once upon a time, we had temples. Now we have timelines.
The Church of Twitter (The Angry Vatican)
Populated by philosophers, comedians, armchair theologians, and sociopaths with anime avatars. Theology is debated in 280 characters. If you’re wrong, you’ll know instantly—someone with 12 followers and a burning purpose will tell you. 🔥
Ratio = divine judgment.
Mute = spiritual ascension.
Block = holy exorcism.
The Temple of Instagram
Aesthetic monotheism. Worship through sunlight, lenses, and “casual” latte art.
High priests preach minimalism from rented Airbnbs. Every selfie says: “I’m enough (but please validate that).”
The Cathedral of YouTube
Long-form prophets delivering thirty-minute visual sermons titled “Capitalism Is the New Zodiac Sign.”
Comments section ≈ chaos vortex. Half confession, half riot.
The Reddit Cults
Reclusive monks arguing 24/7. Each subreddit a splinter sect; each mod, a crusader.
“And lo, the Redditor said unto the newbie: source?”
Dogma enforced by upvotes. Doubt punished by downvotes. Piety measured in karma.
TikTok Evangelicals
The ecstatic believers. They dance, they cry, they manifest through filters. Every sound trend is scripture. Every duet, ecstatic worship. 💃📜
LinkedIn Cathedral
Corporate spirituality at its finest. Influencers in suits preaching hustle theology.
“Yesterday I fired myself to hire a better me. #Leadership #Blessed #NotAFiringJustGrowth”
IV. Sin and Salvation in the Age of Wi-Fi ⚡
For every religion, a morality. For every user, a timeline of shame.
Digital Sins:
- Posting without context 😱
- Using Comic Sans unironically
- Selfies in funerals (digital blasphemy)
- Tweeting “I can’t do this anymore” for the 4th time that week
- Reacting to tragedy with “vibes only”
Digital Repentance:
A tearful Notes-App apology. A “mental health break” post. A rebrand followed by a quote from Rumi or a Greek philosopher you only half-remember.
Redemption is always one content pivot away.
Ten Commandments of the Algorithmic Faith
- Thou shalt not repost without credit.
- Thou shalt not idolize verified users; they are but blue-ticked mortals.
- Thou shalt honor thy engagement rate.
- Thou shalt keep holy the upload schedule.
- Thou shalt not edit out the watermark; the Algorithm notices.
- Thou shalt not ghost thy mutuals.
- Thou shalt not covet thy neighbor's viral success.
- Thou shalt not cancel without receipts.
- Thou shalt bear no false hashtags.
- Thou shalt love thine audience, but not enough to read the comments.
And lo, those who broke these commandments shall be ratioed into eternal irrelevance.
V. The Great Schism: Offline Heresy 😵💫
But the faithful have grown restless. There now walk among us the unplugged. The heretics. The ones who “don’t have an online presence.”
They speak in strange tongues: “I go outside.” 🌳
They commit unspeakable acts: “I read books—offline.”
They threaten our faith itself by saying “I don’t tweet, I just live.”
Blasphemy.
Modern morality isn’t measured by virtue—it’s measured by engagement ratios. To disappear is the new atheism. To go untagged is death.
Even old religions now submit to the Cloud. There are priests on TikTok, pastors optimizing YouTube thumbnails, astrologers posting branded collabs with incense companies. Even enlightenment is paywalled!
We didn’t lose belief; we outsourced it.
We stopped worshipping gods and started worshipping analytics.
VI. Spiritual Capitalism: Selling Salvation Since 2004 💰✨
We buy holy relics now—ring lights, productivity planners, MacBooks with the divine logo half-glowing like stained glass. Amazon is our sacred market where lightning deals are miracles.
Everyone is building their own gospel: “How I Manifested Six Figures by Vlogging My Nervous Breakdown.”
Confessionals are now monetized as “storytime videos.”
Suffering is curated, anguish optimized for ad placement.
Influencer culture is just televangelism with better filters. 📸
But maybe the biggest joke of all?
We’re all both the preacher and the congregation.
VII. Apocalypse Lite™: When the Internet Goes Down ☠️
Imagine, dear children, the Great Blackout—when the sacred servers freeze.
Wi-Fi fails. The timeline halts. The meme supply withers. Humanity, without dopamine, must look each other in the eye again.
The first hour: disbelief.
The second hour: chaos.
The third: mass existentialism and candle selfies labeled #EndOfWiFi.
Historians will call it The Great Logoff. Few will survive with their sanity intact. Those who do will discover—painfully—that the sun still rises without notifications. ☀️
VIII. Closing Benediction: 🕊️ Log Out and Pray
Go forth and post, my digital disciples. Spread the good word through memes and marginally hot takes. May your feed be blessed and your comments section free of demons.
“Blessed be the muted, for they shall find peace.”
Before you click away, though—ask yourself this:
When you say you’re “posting for yourself,” who exactly are you trying to convince?
Maybe we haven’t lost our faith in God—maybe we just swapped the pulpit for a screen.
We replaced the search for God with the search bar. 🔍
And somehow... it still feels empty.Amen, and please “laugh.” 🙏📡
Epilogue: A Few last Words ✝️💬
Now, before I end it — no, I’m not here to drag anyone’s faith. If you genuinely believe in something kinder, higher, and good, that’s beautiful. Truly. 🙏✨
Faith, when practiced sincerely, can make people gentler, and God knows we could use more of that. But let’s be real — it’s the charlatans that drive me insane. The preachers who sound more like sales reps. The influencers baptizing ring lights in holy water.
And yes, the people who quote scripture in their bio right next to their OnlyFans link — like, ma’am, I’m not judging your hustle, but pick a vibe. 💅📖 The cross necklace and the “$10.99/month for premium holiness” combo is… confusing, at best. Maybe it’s just me.
It’s not the faith I take issue with — it’s the marketing campaign pretending to be faith. The performance. The hypocrisy. The way the loudest “believers” often make the quiet, sincere ones look foolish by association.
So this isn’t blasphemy; it’s exasperation. Believe whatever brings you joy — just don’t commodify sanctity for clout.
Keeping the servers warm and the blasphemy humorous,
Allen
FriedReads.com | @Allen_Fried
