The modern academic study of religion, while aspiring to be objective and scientific, has in fact been compromised by the intrusion of faith upon its mission. (religion-online.org)
Traditionally the scientific study of religion had been limited to those aspects of life and culture explicitly linked with belief in a supernatural being or forces. (religion-online.org)
It has sometimes been replaced now by the historical study of all religion as a human phenomenon. (religion-online.org)