Religion & Star Trek

MH from Our Word directed me to an interesting post at Jimmy Akin's blog on the role of religion in Star Trek. Anyone who watches the various Star Trek shows and movies knows religion holds a special place in Gene Roddenberry's series... often a place for scorn and derision.

...Multiple episodes (and the first Star Trek movie) are all based on the
idea of going into space and symbolically finding God and finding out that he's
a fraud, or an alien, or a child, or a computer, or insane, or some combination
of these. The two twin themes Roddenberry felt drawn to were "God is unworthy of
worship" (for one reason or another) and "There ain't no paradise except the
Federation" (all other paradaisical societies having some horrible hidden
flaw).

A while back, MH and I talkd about this very subject and how Deep Space 9 actually takes a bold and fresh direction where religion is concerned... namely, that it isn't just a subject for ridicule. In fact, the more interesting characters on DS9 are those who practice a specific faith.

Before reaching this conclusion, I considered the Deep Space 9 series one of the best among the various Star Trek series. I tend to go back to rewatch more DS9 episodes than the original series and Next Gen... and don't even start mentioning Voyager. ;)