GR organised religion cf. personal beliefs

[Terrance]

Blame Civilization. The Human. The human mind. Dostoyevsky's human
heart. 


The majority of the human race has been and remains religious. 
A fact. We have to deal with it. We can say that religion has been bad
or has been the author of evil doings and so forth or we can point to
examples to argue the good of religions, but a the end of the day,
humans are and have been religious. Humans are and have been
technological. Humans are and have been civilized. 


Can we shake it off? Should we? How deep is it? 

  Freud rejected "psychological illusions" and various idealistic
solutions to
the cultural tensions of human life (Marxism, Christianity,
Anarchism, etc.). However, for Freud, (and for Pynchon too, BTW) the
tension is in the nature of things and in the nature of man  and so
there is no way out of this tension.  Take a look at the famous hair cut
episode in GR.
Self-preservation is placed under Eros in Freud's C&D and it is set
against the instinct of death or destruction. Instinct, in both Freud
and in Pynchon, is nostalgic, it is an 

"impulsion toward the restoration
of a situation which once existed but was brought to an end by some
external disturbance. This essentially conservative character of
instincts is exemplified by the phenomenon of the compulsion to repeat.
The picture which life presents to us is the result of the working of
Eros and the death-instinct together and against each other." Freud