Religion purports to explain all the important stuff that people wonder about, and which science hasn’t yet explained. Religion will therefore exist so long as science cannot adequately explain things that people need to have explanations for.

As science progressively explains more and more of the universe, religion in the West is being pressured and squeezed at every turn. As the body of scientific knowledge grows, the sphere of religious influence in the West is threatened. But not so in those theocracies where religious influence is enshrined by law and protected from the ravages of science by the force of the government.

Religion can explain virtually anything, and is unfettered by the strictures of rational thought or the scientific method - faith is all that is required for religious proof. On the other hand, scientific proof is difficult, expensive and time-consuming, and progresses labouriously at a snail’s pace from the possible, to the probable, to the certain. This gives religion an advantage.

To maintain that evolution is consistent with a belief in God is easy - so long as the belief in God does not include faith-based facts which are inconsistent with scientifically proven ones. But as soon as that line is crossed then the struggle is most definitely on.