Book Comment: Star Trek FAQ

            Those who love science fiction television and movies are usually enthusiasts of either the Star Trek or Star Wars franchises, but often not of both. I admit to being a Trekkie.

FAQ, for those who do not know, is frequently asked questions. Clark’s book discusses every question you might ask and then a few more. Subjects include the developmental starts and stops of the television shows and movies including planned but never-released projects, the historical and literary background leading up to the first appearance of TOS (The Original Series), as the original Star Trek is often known, corporate backroom deals, the animated series, actor feuds, clashes with producers, gadgets and props, costumes, special effects, and the pre-Trek careers of the directors, producers, network executives, and the actors, including even the “redshirts” and other minor recurring character actors. Clark pulls no punches about some of the abrasive personalities and faults of the people he discusses.

For the hardcore Trek enthusiast, these things alone make this a good read.

Now, as to why this book is being mentioned on this blog: When they actually look at it in depth and with critical thinking, some are surprised that there are religious undertones in much of science fiction, and even in many horror films. The undertones can show an orthodox Christian slant but often they do not. Even those which are actively atheist can touch on religious themes and atheism can be viewed as a religion or, at the very least, a philosophical stance on the subject of religion.

The creator of Star Trek, Gene Roddenberry (1921-1991), was raised in Texas (USA) as a Southern Baptist. As an adult, he rejected organized religion and was often spoken of as an atheist but could more properly be described as a pantheistic agnostic. He thought that in the future mankind would reject religions and become more religiously numinous in an unfocused way with a sort of progressive humanist and secularist religiosity or spirituality. Mankind would not be actively anti-religion but would mostly just ignore it.  Along with this, Roddenberry also exhibited a belief in the ultimate perfectibility of man.

Roddenberry rejected a suggestion from National Broadcasting Company executives to include a chaplain in the Enterprises’ crew. In TOS episodes religious leaders are most commonly troublesome people even when they are genuinely well-meaning. Many are depicted as repressive of original thought.

When seemingly divine almost omnipotent beings occur in the series, they are eventually exposed as being computers developed by long-extinct species or as mortal beings possessing highly advanced technologies.

It was not until the third series, Star Trek: Deep Space Nine, that a religion was presented as a possibly positive force. The Bajoran people worshipped the prophets, whom other species referred to as the wormhole aliens, not actually divine but highly advanced in their technology.

Some Trekkers (who view Trekkie as a perjorative) will argue for hours about minutiae of Star Trek information, especially about what is canon and what is not. In 1994, Michael Jendra, a professor at the University of Wisconsin, published “Star Trek Fandom as a Religious Phenomenon” in the academic journal, Sociology of Religion. Film director Nicholas Meyer has described Star Trek as a “religion without theology.”

Gene Roddenberry is quoted about this: “I’m not a guru. … I certainly didn’t write Scripture and my feeling is that those who did weren’t treated very well in the end.”

Live Long and Prosper!

Clark, Mark, Star Trek FAQ. Everything Left to Know About the First Voyages of the Starship Enterprise (Milwaukee, WI: Applause Theatre and Cinema Books, 2012)

Tracing Your Ancestors in Church or Synagogue Records

The Mormons do genealogical work as part of their religious activities called Temple Work. The concept a non-Mormon would most readily recognize is "baptism for the dead" which is mentioned in  1 Corinthians 15:29. What "baptism for the dead" might actually mean is not an object of discussion in this particular post.

I am not a Mormon and it is not necessary for you to be a Mormon to be interested in your family history. Your ancestry is a large part of who you are. It is your link to history. You love your parents. Why not also learn of and love your great-great-great-great-great-great-grandparents?

There are many techniques genealogists use to trace family relationships. One of them is studying church and synagogue records. These are as much primary source records as are public civil records.

Jewish genealogy seems to present particular problems since there is very little centralization of the records. The following repositories may be helpful: The Center for Jewish History, the American Jewish Archives at the Hebrew Union College Jewish Institute of Religion, the Douglas Goldman Jewish Genealogy Center, and the Jewish Genealogical Center. The New York Public Library has a Jewish Genealogy Collection. If your family has a long connection with a particular synagogue there may be records available of some family specific information.

Christian church records are also highly fragmented because of the existence of over 200 different religious denominations in the United States alone. 

Many of today's Christian religious denominations have gone through highly contentious times, with multiple mergers, splits, mutinies, power battles, excommunications, shunnings, relocations, etc. Many splinter groups declared themselves to be the original pre-split group. The groups often took with them as many historical documents as possible. Lawsuits over ownership of property and documents produced court records which are also primary historical source material.

Organizational records may include payroll information, property rental and purchase documents, tax records, employment records, records of disciplinary actions, chains of command and job descriptions, etc. The records may also contain personal records (births, marriages, deaths, burials, consecrations, and ordinations.

When individuals shifted their allegiance from one group to another their church-held vital genealogical records usually were not shifted with them and remained with the parent group. The records may now be stored in the archives of the original body (which may or may not be in their original geographic  location.)

If you know the dates when organizational shifts occurred or the approximate dates when your ancestors moved from one group to another, you may be abler to infer the likeliest place to begin searching for a particular record. Early public records are often spotty and incomplete or even totally lost due to floods,  ,fires, or wartime rapacity. The only extant record of the marriage of your great-great-great-grandparents, who lived in California, may be housed in church archives in Florida for a group which originated in Minnesota.

Many universities and colleges with denominational ties have extensive records. Samford University (Southern Baptist) and Birmingham Southern College (Methodist) are two examples. Contact the national headquarters of your particular religious denomination and they may be able to steer you to their own historical repositories.

Christians

Jenna Elfman: b. 1971, California State, USA. (aka: Jennifer Maria Butala Elfman). American television and film actress. She is married to the musician Bodhi Elfman. Raised in the Roman Catholic Church, she is now a member of the Church of Scientology.

Jeri Ryan: b. 1968, Munich, Germany. (aka: Jeri Lynn Zimmerman) American film and television actress. Roman Catholic Church.

Kate Mulgrew: b. 1955, Iowa State, USA. (aka: Katherine Kiernan Maria Mulgrew) American film and television actress. Roman Catholic Church.

Dakota Fanning: b. 1994, Georgia State, USA. (aka: Hannah Dakota Fanning) American film actress. Southern Baptist.

Elle Fanning: b. 1998, Georgia State, USA. (aka: Mary Elle Fanning) American film actress. Southern Baptist.

Dominant Religious Groups in the United States

This link at businessinsider.com shows a graphic of the dominant religious groups in each county in the United States of America. I believe that the article itself will translate, but I am not sure about the legends accompanying the graphic itself, For readers in languages other than English, the listing below gives the colors of the boxes and the names of the associated religious groups. In most of the major metropolitan areas there are, of course, hundreds of different religious traditions present.

Current statistics show Christian identification declining and "non-affiliated" or "non-religious" identification rising in the USA.

http://www.businessinsider.com/the-religious-makeup-of-america-2015-4

Lavender: American Baptists Churches in the USA
Blue: Roman Catholic Church
Yellow: Christian Churches and Churches of Christ
Light Brown: Evangelical Lutheran Church in America
Grey: Latter-day Saints (Mormons)
Dark Brown: Lutheran Church - Missouri Synod
Red: Southern Baptist Convention
Dark Green: United Methodist Church
Light Green: Other
White: None Reported

The Prime Minister of Humor

Grady Nutt, an ordained Southern Baptist minister, was professionally known as The Prime Minister of Humor.  He appeared weekly on the country music and comedy based television series, Hee Haw. His hilarious church-related comedy was based on the culture of the southern region of the United States. His appearances at churches and religious events always led to a sermon based on the jokes with which he began his talk.

Grady Nutt died in an small airplane crash.

http://www.the-cartoonist.com/Nutt/Nutt.html

http://www.gradynutt.com/about.html

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I6w-HkQrxgQ

Southern Baptists Elect First Black President

On 19 June 2012 the Southern Baptist Convention unanimously elected the extremely popular Pastor Fred Luter (b. 1956, Louisiana, USA) as its president.  This had national significance because Pastor Luter is black. 

The Southern Baptist Convention (SBC) is the world’s largest Baptist group and is the largest Protestant body in the United States. The SBC is evangelical, congregational, and  insists on only believer’s baptism (they are anti-pedobaptists). The Convention was founded in 1845 in Augusta, Georgia (USA) during a dispute with Northern Baptists over slave ownership.  The Northerners refused to allow the appointment of slaveholders to positions of authority.

After the United States Civil War , most of the black Baptists in the American South withdrew to form their own organizations, culminating in 1895 with the National Baptist Convention.

Though the majority of Southern Baptists have long since left behind their embarrassing origins, it was not until 1995 that the group officially renounced and apologized for its racist origins.  By 2008, the SBC had over one million black members.

The Lord's Prayer in Greek

Here is The Lord's Prayer, read in modern Greek pronunciation with a literal English translation below the Greek text.  The Koine (Common) Greek pronunciation would, of course, not be exactly the same as modern Greek.

Dr. James Blanton at the Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky (USA) demonstrated that the Koine was pronounced more similarly to modern Greek than to the Erasmian pronunciation which many academics use.  Dr. Blanton based this demonstration on misspellings in hand-copied Greek texts from the first few Christian centuries.

Since the texts were copied by men transcribing what was being read aloud from a master text, misspellings of words showed how many of the vowels had similar sounds and could be mistaken for one another by inexperienced scribes.  Since the pronunciation of some words was known for certain, the pronunciations of other words could be deduced.

The Fire of the Faith

“Christians, like coals of fire, cease to glow when they become separated from the group.”  Herschel H. Hobbs (1907-1995) 

Hobbs was the president of the Southern Baptist Convention (1962-1963) and was the chairman of the Baptist Faith and Message committee.

Firestorm: The Contraception Mandate

As I have stated repeatedly, this is not, never has been, and never will be a political blog.  That will not stop me from speaking on matters of religion which touch upon politics.  There is currently in the United States a political firestorm begun when the Obama administration mandated that employee health plans must cover contraception, including the abortifacient "morning after pill."  While churches, synagogues, and mosques are exempt, any affiliated entities such as hospitals and social services are not.  The response did not take long, and it shouldn't have.

Some suggest, as I have in the past, that Christian organizations should renounce their tax exempt status, refuse federal funding for "faith-based initiatives," and take no federal or state funds for any reason.

One commenter on the LifeSiteNews.com listing below says that the mandate applies even for employers who take no federal funds.  Does anyone know if that is true?  Even if it is, I still think separation is a good idea.  Jesus said to render to Caesar what was Caesars and then he handed the coin back.

http://www.lifesitenews.com/news/southern-baptist-leader-obama-contraception-mandate-is-not-only-a-catholic

http://www.christianpost.com/news/catholic-bishop-blasts-obama-admin-for-contraception-mandate-68039/

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2094206/Catholic-Church-showdown-Obama-U-S-faith-leaders-denounce-contraception-mandate.html

http://www.whitehouse.gov/blog/2012/02/01/health-reform-preventive-services-and-religious-institutions

The website of the National Abortion Rights League
http://www.naral.org/ 

Someone is Always Watching

“I grew up in Birmingham, Ala., a religious town. In my junior year of high school, something I had never expected started happening to my non-Jewish friends. They fell in love with their Christianity. They started reading the Bible. They would talk theology in the cafeteria. It was inspiring, and in a Jewish way, I began doing the same. I dusted off the Bible I had received as a bar mitzvah gift, and like my non-Jewish friends, read it cover to cover. The more engaged I became with my Judaism, the more I fell in love with it. By the time I was 17, I had set my sights on the rabbinate. In a way, my Southern Baptist friends turned me into a rabbi.” Rabbi Aaron Miller, assistant rabbi at Washington Hebrew Congregation, Washington, D.C. (USA)

Read the entire article here: 

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/guest-voices/post/for-new-local-rabbi-a-blessed-life/2011/11/01/gIQADMKdfM_blog.html

“Walk in wisdom toward them that are without, redeeming the time. “ Colossians 4:5

“Ye are our epistle written in our hearts, known and read of all men:  Forasmuch as ye are manifestly declared to be the epistle of Christ ministered by us, written not with ink, but with the Spirit of the living God; not in tables of stone, but in fleshy tables of the heart.” 2 Corinthians 3:2-3

Someone is always watching you even if you do not know it.  You are God's letter to them.  What will they read in that letter?

Gridiron Men's Conference 2011

The Gridiron Men's Conference will be held July 29-30, 2011 at the Coleman Coliseum in Tuscaloosa, Alabama.  The conference is associated with Phil Waldrep Ministries  and with Pine Terrace Baptist Church.  Coleman Coliseum is the home of the University of Alabama men's and women's basketball teams.

Speakers at the conference include sports announcer Pat Summerall, 1996 Heisman Trophy Winner and National Football League quarterback Danny Wuerffel, National Basketball Association executive Pat Williams, Big Oak Ranch founder John Croyle, Christian comedian Ken Davis, and Baptist Minister of Music Charles Billingsley.



For those who may not know, "gridiron" is a reference to American-style football.  The rectangular shape of the football field, crossed by regularly spaced painted lines, resembles a gridiron (griddle), a metal frame of parallel bars used to broil or grill meat, fish, and vegetables.

The word "griddle" comes from the Old North French word "gredil" and, ultimately, from the Latin word "cratis," a lattice or wickerwork.

Book Comment: The Baptist Faith and Message

This book, The Baptist Faith and Message (1971), by Herschel H. Hobbs, was actually somewhat controversial upon its release.  Many called it ultra-conservative, even fundamentalist.  Actually it is a clear and concise statement of the beliefs of the majority of Southern Baptists.

Baptists come from the Anabaptist tradition, insisting on adult believer's baptism and denying the usefulness of infant baptism.  The name of the Southern Baptist Convention (the SBC) reflects our particular denomination's historical origins.  We arose during the conflict between North and South, the American Civil War.  We have long since left behind the main source of conflict with our northern brethren, a defense of the institution of slavery, and we are now worldwide, not merely "southern."  We number about 13,000,000.

The SBC is congregational; each church is autonomous and participation in state and national conventions is voluntary.  Each church calls its own pastor(s) and elects its own deacons (elders).  Elected representatives from the church attend the state and national conventions.  Statements by the conventions are "advisory" but are not binding on local churches.

The Baptist Faith and Message discusses our main doctrinal points.
1. We believe in "the competency of the soul in religion."  Man is endowed by God with the privilege of choice.  The relationship is between God and the individual believer.  Every person on Earth has an equal right to direct access to God.  The priesthood of all believers means that all believers have the right to read and interpret the scriptures as led by the Holy Spirit.
2. Baptism is by immersion only (βαπτίζω is Greek, meaning "I immerse").  Baptism is not a magical act, it is a statement of belief.
3. We practice "closed communion."
4. The Scriptures are inspired and inerrant in all their assertions.  They were written by men, divinely inspired, whose individual personalities and writing styles can be heard in their writings.  All doctrine must be based on the totality of scripture, not on hand-picked individual verses.  The ultimate criterion for interpretation of the Bible (Old and New Testaments) is Jesus Christ.
5. We are obligated by our salvation to offer this salvation to whoever will accept it.  We are not to compel or coerce belief.
6. We have a living faith, not a creedal one.
7. God is utterly holy and perfect.  He exists as one God in Three Persons, The Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit.  His ultimate revelation of Himself to man is Jesus Christ.
8. Man is created in God's image.  Every person on Earth is worthy of respect.
9. There is nothing we can do to earn our salvation, it is the freely given gift of God.
10. All believers are saints, "set apart."  The process of sanctification of the believer proceeds over our lifetime as we become increasingly like Christ; the believer's ultimate destiny is moral and spiritual perfection, like Jesus.  This is not the result of the believer's actions, but by the work of the Holy Spirit upon him or her.
11. All true believers endure to the end.
12. The Church, the Bride of Christ, is the ἐκκλησία, the body of all believers in Christ down through the ages and for all time to come.
13. The Lord's Supper (communion) is a symbolic act of obedience to Jesus.  It is for baptized believers only.

Who Am I?

All bloggers who use the Blogger service have statistical tools available to them so that they can track usage of their blog.  The types of information which we can see include the number of times the blog is viewed, the number of times each post is viewed, the type of operating system being used by the viewer, the search engine used to visit the blog, the search keywords, and the country of origin of the search. The statistical information is useful in better responding to the interests of our readers.  Your privacy is 100% preserved because we cannot identify individual visitors to our blogs.

Several persons have searched for me.  One person has asked about my "spiritual credentials."  The answer is that I am not your teacher, I am not your pastor; I am your Christian brother and I feel that this blog is my ministry to you.  This blog is for discussion of doctrinal and theological issues, current news as it relates to Christianity, the incredible diversity present among the ἐκκλησία through the centuries and especially today,  and the true basis of our unity, The Holy Spirit, who indwells every believer.  Most of all, this blog is a challenge to everyone to think, to not just accept the way things are, to wonder why things are the way they are, to challenge those things in our belief systems which are not biblical, and especially, to not accept the answers put forth by our modern relativist culture.

As to me, I am a Medical Technologist with a concentration in Hematology, the study of blood diseases like leukemias, anemias, and clotting disorders.  I work in two local clinical laboratories and have a certification by the American Society for Clinical Pathology .

In 1970, I was one of the three hundred who stood up and left in protest, along with our pastor, Dr. Herbert Gilmore, when The First Baptist Church of Birmingham voted not to admit Winifred Bryant and her daughter, Twila Fortune, who had made a profession of faith.  The reason they were refused membership was because they were black.

Led by Dr. Gilmore, we formed The Baptist Church of the Covenant, which is still active today in downtown Birmingham.  Both Winifred Bryant and Twila Fortune remain as members of the church.

The local church I currently attend has members of all races and nationalities.

In my early twenties, for two years I attended The Southern Baptist Theological Seminary in Louisville, Kentucky.  During this time, my interest in comparative religion developed.  Over the years I have studied the world's major religions and have discussed and corresponded with adherents of each of them.
I have also been in contact with numerous cultic and occultic groups including Wiccans, Pagans, Spiritualists, the Unity Church, the Unification Church, the International Society for Krishna Consciousness, the Children of God, the Way, the Church of Scientology, and even the Church of Satan.

My interest in word origins and meanings led to my study of onomastics, the meanings of place names, and resulted in my book, An International Glossary of Place Name Elements .

I believe that I do have something to add to the discussion and I feel led by the Lord to do it.

Barlow Girl

I have to admit that I don't follow contemporary Christian music.  My tastes in music run to guitar-heavy instrumentals (Joe Satriani ), classical music (Wolfgang Mozart , Erik Satie ), and electronic music (Isao Tomita , Kraftwerk ).

I learned of the beautiful music of the three member group known as BarlowGirl  from "The Walk," the blog of Glen Cantrell , a bivocational Southern Baptist preacher in Sikeston, Missouri (USA).  Bivocational pastors work for small churches which choose not to, or are financially unable to, support a full-time pastor.  Though they work full time away from the church to support themselves, most end up working full time at the church also.  They are a special dedicated breed.

BarlowGirl  consists of three sisters (Alyssa, Rebecca, and Lauren Barlow) who produce beautiful three-part harmonies in what is defined as Christian Rock Music.  They have been nominated for ten Dove Awards.

What Is Your Religious Tradition?

People from 58 countries are now reading this blog.  We, I am sure, come from numerous and varied religious traditions.  I am a member of a church affiliated with the Southern Baptist Convention (13,000,000 members, primarily in the United States) and live in the US State of Alabama.  I would describe my country and my religious affiliation as:

United States: Trinitarian, Evangelical, Baptist.

Any readers of this blog who would like to identify themselves by country and religious tradition can do so below by leaving a comment.  Just click on the blue "comments." It should be interesting to see who we all are.

Size Does Not Matter

"Being a great church is not about being a big church.  A great church keeps focused on spreading the gospel.  A small church that spreads the gospel is a great church.  A big church is not a great church if it's not doing that."  Rev. Mike Shaw, elected 17 Nov. 2010 as President of the Alabama Baptist Convention.  Shaw is the pastor of The First Baptist Church of Pelham (Alabama, USA).

Christians

At some time during their lives, the following people have publicly identified themselves as Christian. Inclusion in this list does not indicate approval or disapproval of the person, their religious beliefs, or their actions. This is a recurring segment in this blog.

Thomas Dyer: (b. Tennessee, USA) A former Southern Baptist pastor, in 2009 Dyer became the first Buddhist to become a United States military chaplain.

Lobegott Friedrich Constantin von Tischendorf: (b. 1815, Germany – d. 1874), German Biblical scholar.Translated the Codex Ephraemi Rescriptus, a 5th century Greek manuscript of the New Testament and found the Codex Sinaiticus, a 4th century New Testament manuscript. He was a university professor.

Liu Zhenying: (b. 1958, China, aka: Brother Yun) House church leader, evangelist, proponent of the Back to Jerusalem movement. He was arrested and tortured over 30 times by Chinese communist authorities. In 2001, he walked out of prison in full view of his guards, no one stopped him, no doors were locked. He now operates out of Germany.

Robert Charles Guccione, Jr. (b. 1956) Latin rite Roman Catholic. Music magazine (Spin) founder. Publisher of Discover magazine. Son of Penthouse magazine founder, Bob Guccione, from whom he is estranged.

John Venn: (b. 1834, England – d. 1923)Logician, philosopher, and Anglican priest. His mathematical work has influenced set theory, probability, logic, statistics, and computer science. He was a mechanical genius particularly adept at building machines.

Christian Comment on Films, Part 1

To even begin to really understand a subject requires years of study and application. This holds true whether the subject is hitting a curveball with a wooden bat, understanding the difference between hairy cell leukemia and multiple myeloma, putting in a bathroom exhaust fan, playing a clarinet, repairing an aortic aneurism, preaching a sermon, or illustrating a comic book, the key to mastery of a subject is repetition and attention to detail.

When one approaches mastery of a subject, recurrent patterns begin to seem obvious, even predictable. Wayne Gretzky appeared to know, without looking, where all the other players were on the ice, because he did know. To quote The Great One, "Don't go where the puck was. Go where the puck is going to be." That is mastery of a subject.

I make no claim of having achieved film mastery; one viewing of The Independent Film Channel's sarcastic game show program, The Ultimate Film Fanatic, disabused me of that notion, but, by my own personal count, as of today, I have seen 6117 films.

Most of the films I've seen only once, and, for most of them, once was plenty. A few were good enough to view repeatedly and a very few can only be described as artistic masterpieces.

I make no apology for loving movies and I make no apology for having seen some films of which you probably would not approve. As I once told my son when we went to see the Rolling Stones, you can appreciate someone's artistry with approving of their lifestyle, or, for that matter, their message.

Growing up in a conservative Southern Baptist environment, I knew people who never saw any films, even religious ones, because they considered them to be evil, or, at best, a distracting "bad influence." I didn't believe then, and don't believe now, that films, in and of themselves, are outside God's will for Christians. They are like all other forms of art, neutral. The content of the films and the intent of the filmmakers are what give them their worth, or lack of it.

While I agree that many modern films are pure trash, some take the art of filmmaking to great heights and are as brilliant as a sculpture by Michelangelo, a Wayne Gretzky goal, a Jack Kirby or Steve Ditko superhero bursting out of the confines of a comic book panel, or one of Mozart's symphonies. Those films, admittedly, are rare.

Book Comment: The Meaning of Star Trek

In the Star Trek universe, science has eliminated prejudice, war, poverty, disease, and hunger. The main thing it can't change is human/sentient nature. Most of the characters in the series of television programs and films are competent and brilliant, the best in their fields, and most are flawed. Captain James Kirk passed the unpassable training test by changing the test; he cheated. Captain Jean Luc Picard is compassionate but is all work and can't have a really close relationship with anyone. Lt. Worf is a Klingon who fits best among Humans. Constable Odo is a liquid shapeshifter who loves one of the "solids." B'Elana Torres is a Human/Klingon half-breed who hates her violent Klingon nature. Visiting family members are often viewed with dread. Many of the stories in the series come from the character's internal conflicts.

In The Meaning of Star Trek, Thomas Richards discusses the reasons why Star Trek is becoming recognized as more than just a series of movies and television programs. I'm not sure that the creator, Gene Rodenberry, had it all in mind when he wrote the first draft of his pilot for the original Star Trek series, but it is more than obvious that Richards is correct in saying that the decided philosophical bent of the franchise soon became intentional.

Richards discusses, with examples from the various Star Trek programs, the uses and meanings of "myth" and "story." Also discussed are the distinction between individual and corporate; the often violated Federation Prime Directive (observe but do not interfere); the essentially rational nature of the universe; the corruption of governments versus the nobility of the individual; the notion that all of the sentient species of the universe have a common origin; and the realization that carried to its extreme, technology might exterminate the individual.

In the Star Trek universe, organized religion is almost universally shown to be corrupt, especially in its leadership. Where religion is viewed as ennobling is with the individual, even though the individual is usually shown to be misguided in his/her beliefs. The Vulcans meditate and concentrate and still can't rid themselves of their feelings. Lt. Worf tries valiantly to believe in the Klingon religion but can gain only a cultural appreciation of his heritage. A group of Jem Hadar warriors choose religious loyalty over life; they decide to die rather than to disobey the orders of their Vorta whom they know has betrayed them. An alien couple chooses to let their son die rather than violate his body by introducing alien medicines. The Bajorans worship a group of disembodied aliens who live in a cosmic Wormhole and do nothing to discourage the worship.

The "deities" seen in the Star Trek universe (*) are seemingly omnipotent but are not omniscient. They resemble the ancient Roman gods more than the Judeo-Christian God. They are often self-obsessed, arbitrary, and unconcerned about the effects of their actions on others. *: The Organians, Q, the Traveller, Trelayne (who may be Q), Adonais, etc,

To my knowledge, there is not a single openly Christian character in the Star Trek universe. This, and the attitude discussed above, may be seen to reflect the feelings of the series creator, Gene Rodenberry. He was raised as a Southern Baptist and as an adult came to reject all organized religion.