Religion: a series of unsupported assertions involving magic pixies. Science: a series of discoveries derived from empirical evidence.

Sadly, most people just want to be told what to think, and those who know least feel totally unconstrained in providing babble for the masses. It takes a functioning brain to understand reality, but every simple-minded person can embrace a plain tale and not notice how incoherent and self-contradictory it is.

It's notable that southern Europe, where the Catholic Church clung on for centuries after the Protestant schism, still produces fewer scientists and fewer research papers than northern European countries. The dead hand of mindless superstition lingers for an awfully long time.