Religion is a broad and often enigmatic set of beliefs, values, practices, and moral attitudes. Some scholars define it socially, as a social genus that is present in more than one culture, while others treat it functionally, as a group of belief and practice patterns that encapsulates the ways people organize their lives. These different approaches to the concept impose limitations on what can be counted as a religion, and in doing so they alter the scope of possible answers to questions that arise about the phenomenon.
A key question is how people become religious, which may require a consideration of what motivates them to believe and do things. Religions provide a range of responses to these motivations, including a sense of moral community, support in times of trouble, and a connection to tradition. They also offer a sense of meaning in life and of an ultimate goal, whether this is a proximate form of life (a wiser, more fruitful, more charitable, or more successful way of living) or the rebirth that lies at the end of the human project.
Some critics contend that to understand religion in terms of beliefs reveals an anti-Catholic bias, and that it would be better for historians of religion to shift attention from hidden mental states to the institutional structures that produce religiosity. This, however, risks neglecting the importance of examining what the religions actually do. They make it possible to achieve important goals — proximate and ultimate — in the face of an acknowledged but largely unknown future, and they provide ways of evaluating the decisions and actions that people undertake to reach their objectives.