Religion of Humanity

Comte developed the Religion of Humanity for positivist societies in order to fulfill the cohesive function once held by traditional worship.

[3][4] According to Tony Davies, Comte's secular and positive religion was "a complete system of belief and ritual, with liturgy and sacraments, priesthood and pontiff, all organized around the public veneration of Humanity", referred to as the Nouveau Grand-Être Suprême (New Supreme Great Being).

They would conduct services, including Positivist prayer, which was "a solemn out-pouring, whether in private or in public, of men's nobler feelings, inspiring them with larger and more comprehensive thoughts."

The priests would be international ambassadors of altruism, teaching, arbitrating in industrial and political disputes, and directing public opinion.

[2] Davies argues that Comte's austere and "slightly dispiriting" philosophy of humanity – viewed as alone in an indifferent universe (which can only be explained by "positive" science) – "was even more influential in Victorian England than the theories of Charles Darwin or Karl Marx".

[5] The system was ultimately unsuccessful but, along with Darwin's On the Origin of Species, it influenced the proliferation of various Secular Humanist organizations in the 19th century, especially through the work of secularists such as George Holyoake and Richard Congreve.

Although Comte's English followers, including George Eliot and Harriet Martineau, for the most part rejected the full panoply of his system, they liked the idea of a religion of humanity and his injunction to "vivre pour altrui" ("live for others", from which comes the word "altruism").

Influenced by his father's ideas, the younger William Beveridge laid the foundations for the welfare state in Britain with a major report, precipitating the creation of the National Health Service.

Cândido Rondon's conversion proved more solid as he remained an orthodox Positivist and a member of the faith long after the church's importance waned.