The use of Religion to control, manipulate, and gain power

[MusicLovingAtheist]

I have often pondered this idea. It would seem that with such an immense organization there must have been some foul play, somewhere along the lines. I watched a video by Darkmatter2525 called power corrupts. In this video it proposed the origins of religion: man claiming that god spoke to them through a cave that only the elders were allowed to enter. They claimed they had authority from god so they could manipulate the people into doing what they want. There was no god in the cave when the common people investigated the cave and the elders were just using the notion of god to manipulate the people all along. There were more examples but I can't recall them off the top of my head.

I read Chapter 1 of The God Delusion by Richard Dawkins yesterday (we're reading it for a secular club at my college). Richard Dawkins pointed out that religion can be used as a trump card. When someone is bigoted on their own, they are pressed hard for reasoning, when someone is bigoted for religious reasons, they aren't questioned. Or someone writes a Nobel Peace Prize winning paper on how war is bad, they will still have a hard time dodging a draft. However if someone has a parent who is Quaker, they can sail through without conflict. I am eager to read more of The God Delusion.

So obviously religion gets used to push other bigoted beliefs, such as homosexuality is wrong and woman can't expose their skin. It's obvious that religious beliefs can corrupt politicians and individuals minds. Would you say that at the core of a Church is nothing more than a successful Ponzi Scheme? A Ponzi Scheme being an investment that the operator you gave your money to tells you you'll turn around a profit and instead takes your money and you never get anything? That would seem to me what a Church really is. Just telling people they will go to heaven and then takes their money and gives it to the priests and building maintenance (as well as not paying taxes). That is my hypothesis on religious institutions, albeit a very cynical one. Maybe they truly believe in an afterlife, but to me that is all Church really is is a Ponzi Scheme.

So I guess the question is, is anyone to blame for religion? I would imagine that most people today don't know any better. I am not trying to invoke a conspiracy theory, I don't think there is one. Perhaps religion simply can't be helped. It's simply a cancer that arises out of nature, instead of the foul play of individuals. I really want to know how religion itself caught on. I guess people have been mystical since the beginning of time. Maybe it's just in our nature to be religious. That seems unfortunate to me. Or maybe it's the result of a few people who created incredibly successful scams. I often imagine that was the intention behind writing the bible. What do you think causes religion? How corrupt is it?