May the force be fourth..

Apparently (according to the last UK census) Jedi-ism is the fourth largest religion in the UK with over 400,000 adherents, larger than Judaism or Buddhism. I'm waiting with much excitement for the first Jedi faith school to be commissioned, and can only drool with anticipation over what the time table will be like, 9:30 light sabre training, 10:30 Levitation, 11:30 Helmet craft... and so on. What must be concerning for "real" religions is that compared with the normal choices, the manifesto of the Jedi faith seems so damn reasonable, here are some snippets so you can see what I mean,

"The Jedi church has no official doctrine or scripture. The Jedi church recognizes that all living things share a living force and that all people have an innate knowledge of what is right and wrong, and the Jedi Church celebrates this like no other religion."

"The original starwars trilogy was the best visualisation of what we believe, as it is what binds us all together in this faith. There are repeatitive references to an afterlife, in which people in the afterlife can talk to us. I think it is fair to say that many Jedi probably to believe in an afterlife of some sort or another, however, this is really left up to each of us to make a judgement call."

No threats of hell fire, no magic books, no edicts on what you should or shouldn't eat or what you get up to in the privacy of your own bedroom, just cool weapons and an honest (as opposed to making stuff up and calling it "truth") outlook on the things that human beings would like to know but cannot, what is there not to like?

The next census here is on 27th March so hopefully people will think carefully about the religion question, don't just tick "Christian" because that's what your Granny would have done, if you don't believe, and you have no compelling reason to do otherwise, don't be scared to say "No Religion". Future government policy may be influenced by your answer.