Please, don't give me that old time religion

When I was in seminary a few years ago, we read THE ROMAN EMPIRE by M.P.Charlesworth. The book's price was $1.35. I reread it recently and want to share his descripiton of religon as practiced in the Roman Empire.

"All these people(of the Empire) mostly thought of the gods as invisible beings, of great power, immortal and ageless: they were normally beneficent to mankind, an as man needed their help and portection in all the business of daily life, their favor could be obtained and their help secured, if he honored them by regular worhsip and by appropriate sacrifices according to the traditional rites of his country. For the gods were national, invisible and powerful citizens as it were of the country they favored, and the centuries old rituals were the proved means of gaining their support....for as the Roman people had extended its dominion, so their own national Jupiter extended his. Roman gods, if propitiated in the right fashion, would protect Roman citizens, thereby securing the immensity and the eternity of the Roman realm."

This is religion as magic, as a way of controlling the gods. This is religion that calls for the gods to bless us and our nation and curse our enemies or perhaps just be indifferent to them. This kind of religion has captivated and enslaved millions of Christians--but it is not the religion of Jesus.

This kind of archaic religion was the religion of the temple and its sacrificial system. That system said,`Oh, you did this wrong or you are somehow ritualy unclean. Offer this sacrifice and you will be restored into the community of God's people.' This kind of religion was the object of Jesus attack--you have made this house of prayer into a den of thieves. This kind of religion, selfish, archaic, nationalistic, killed Jesus.