AHC:Ancient American Religion among world's top 25

Challenge: Have a religion whose primary roots are from the Americas (including islands) and whose roots go back to at least 1600 be one of the top 25 religions in the world.

Note in measuring the top 25, everyone who considers themselves Christian (from the Mormons to the Copts are in one group). To me at least, Voudon doesn't qualify due to having the majority of its roots traceable to Christianity and/or West African beliefs
 
The easiest method would be to have the Mexicans, Maya or the Incas not be converted to Christianity. This would require a completely different colonization, of course.

Would you count a more prevalent Ghost Dance movement -- although this would probably require an large, independent Native state in western North America somewhere.

Do you have a list somewhere of the current top 25 world religions?

The best I can find is this: http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html, but I can't figure out whether they are a good source. (Although they're pretty honest about their methods)

If so, then that list itself only goes down to 22 religions. Although they cut it off at 500,000 people. They also cut out any religion which is only practiced in one country or region.
 
The easiest method would be to have the Mexicans, Maya or the Incas not be converted to Christianity. This would require a completely different colonization, of course.

Would you count a more prevalent Ghost Dance movement -- although this would probably require an large, independent Native state in western North America somewhere.

Do you have a list somewhere of the current top 25 world religions?

The best I can find is this: http://www.adherents.com/Religions_By_Adherents.html, but I can't figure out whether they are a good source. (Although they're pretty honest about their methods)

If so, then that list itself only goes down to 22 religions. Although they cut it off at 500,000 people. They also cut out any religion which is only practiced in one country or region.
Many Mayas even today continue to practice the old ways albeit in a different form, so it wouldn't be too hard to have them resist conversion totally. In any case though, Ghost Dance religion is out of the question since it only came about AFAIK in the 1890's and even most of the natives considered it a superstitious, reactionary cult.
 
Many Mayas even today continue to practice the old ways albeit in a different form, so it wouldn't be too hard to have them resist conversion totally.

So, this: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chan_Santa_Cruz

In any case though, Ghost Dance religion is out of the question since it only came about AFAIK in the 1890's and even most of the natives considered it a superstitious, reactionary cult.

Yes, I missed the part of the post that said the 1600's.

I think the problem with this, north of Mexico at least, is that the religions are generally closed to conversion, which means that the population of the religion is limited by the population of the nation that practices it.
 
Well, if you're Mormon, the answer is obvious.

But in the real world, without changing the hows and whys of European contact and colonialization, this is hard without some creative wordsmithing. It's also hard to really define specific historic/ancient "religions" in the New World in the absence of known founders, specific scriptures defining the "usses" and "thems", and a surviving priesthood today familiar with specific dogmas and doctrines define them.

To some extent there are enough similarities in world view, certain culture heroes, and practices across the Americas that one could perhaps lump all of them together in a broad sense as "Native American Faiths", with the formalized state polytheisms of MesoAmerica and the Andes being on the "high church" end of the spectrum. There are some culture heroes, such as Coyote, Kokopelli, and the feathered serpent, that are very common throughout north america, and the frequent occurrence of ritual mutilation, war capture and sacrifice rituals, animistic beliefs, and even ritual cannibalism, etc., seem to speak to an underlying commonality among many Native American faiths. So if you do lump them all together - and include synchretized religions such as Mayan catholo-paganism, Sun Dance, etc. maybe you already are there.
 
While I realize it was expressly exempted in the OP, disqualifying Voudoun, Santeria, Candomble and similar faiths because of their "Christian or West African roots" is about on par with disqualifying Christianity because it's just Judaism, really.

It does seem we only need half a million adherents to qualify. There might actually be that many Mayans running around. Or Inuit. Failing that, a native state - either Sequoyah or lettting the Creek in as a state (under an alt-MacGillivray, occupying OTL's Alabama) would seem to leave ripe conditions for the survival of native religion.
 
While I realize it was expressly exempted in the OP, disqualifying Voudoun, Santeria, Candomble and similar faiths because of their "Christian or West African roots" is about on par with disqualifying Christianity because it's just Judaism, really.

It does seem we only need half a million adherents to qualify. There might actually be that many Mayans running around.
Well there are at least 7 million of them, but the majority I'm sure are Catholic. Though a ton of the local saints are actually just pre-Columbian gods.
 
While I realize it was expressly exempted in the OP, disqualifying Voudoun, Santeria, Candomble and similar faiths because of their "Christian or West African roots" is about on par with disqualifying Christianity because it's just Judaism, really.

Whether or Christianity is a Jewish Sect or its own religion, Christianity is still from Asia/Europe/Africa. (OP)
 
The Inca Empire could resist Pizarro's invasion if you butterfly away the civil war that was occurring at the time, at least for long enough to where you get a colonizing power that seeks to just exploit them rather than convert them -- as was the case with British India. Since their population was in the millions, the Inca religion and whatever it might evolve into would certainly have a significant population.
 
The Inca Empire could resist Pizarro's invasion if you butterfly away the civil war that was occurring at the time, at least for long enough to where you get a colonizing power that seeks to just exploit them rather than convert them -- as was the case with British India. Since their population was in the millions, the Inca religion and whatever it might evolve into would certainly have a significant population.

I concur. That is the easiest and most realistic way of meeting the challenge.
 
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