Up until a few weeks ago I used to think that religion is just a facade, but I no longer think that is true. Religion is the center of their beliefs, and a very important factor that drives their actions. When the Boston bomber says &quot;Know you are fighting men who look into the barrel of your gun and see heaven, how can you compete with that?&quot; he is not lying. This is what these people truly believe. They think the metaphysics of this universe works as follows. You walk into a theatre full of people with an assault rifle and start shooting people. This ensures your place in heaven next to God. Then you press the button on your suicide vest to teleport into heaven. Imagine that you were living in the Matrix but instead of a telephone, death is what lets you out of the Matrix. Furthermore, outside of the Matrix there is somebody who has been keeping score and this makes the difference between eternal bliss or eternal torture. The robots that run the Matrix have <i>really</i> engineered the world that way. This is what these people believe, or at least a medieval version of it.<p>Another example is the Heaven&#x27;s Gate suicide cult. Instead of being based on Islam they were based on Christianity. They though that Jesus was an alien and you can reach their UFO (= heaven) by committing suicide. And they did.