History Main / ReligionOfEvil

** ''ComicBook/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy'' had a StoryArc that culminated in the CrisisCrossover ''ComicBook/TheThanosImperative'' dealing with the Universal Church of Truth, originally founded by an evil, insane future version of [[ComicBook/{{Warlock}} Adam Warlock]] via time-travel. They believe in everlasting life, which doesn't sound bad until you learn this dimension is called the Cancerverse. They operate by the creed of "convert or die", and have armies fueled by their sheer, unrelenting faith in life to back that up, as [[LastOfHisKind Gamora]] can attest. And the Magus, their founder, takes control of them to summon [[EldritchAbomination the Many-Angled Ones]] into the main universe.

* The nation of Khalador in ''Literature/TheNightAngelTrilogy'' has one of these. They worship the Khali, the goddess of Suffering, who give them access to a unique form of magic called the Vir. In return, Khaladorans must deliberately create suffering for Khali. Every Khaladoran we see has a penchant for unnecessary strife; for example, Khaladorans don't consider it sex until the man has beaten the woman after. The God-King, Khalador's absolute monarch, takes this UpToEleven, absolutely delighting in his status as a CardCarryingVillain.

* The nation of Khalador in the ''Literature/NightAngelTrilogy'' has one of these. They worship the Khali, the goddess of Suffering, who give them access to a unique form of magic called the Vir. In return, Khaladorans must deliberately create suffering for Khali. Every Khaladoran we see has a penchant for unnecessary strife; for example, Khaladorans don't consider it sex until the man has beaten the woman after. The God-King, Khalador's absolute monarch, takes this UpToEleven, absolutely delighting in his status as a CardCarryingVillain.

* ''ComicBook/StarWarsLegacy'': While the various Sith Orders in Star Wars have gone through numerous iterations and generally only worship themselves, the comic introduces Darth Krayt and his One Sith, a cult run by the Dark Lord [[spoiler:(formerly the fallen Jedi Asharrad Hett)]] that teaches that all members of the Sith are a united entity following a singular vision, which in practice means they worship Krayt as much as anything else. This is so totally at odds with the openly selfish goals of the traditional Sith that the Holocrons of past Sith Lords declare Krayt a heretic and refuse to pass on their wisdom to him, but his reasoning is an attempt to put an end to the infighting that crippled previous Sith Orders precisely because they followed a strict SocialDarwinist path.

[[noreallife]]'''Administrivia/NoRealLifeExamplesPlease''' This is a ''very'' controversial subject and likely to invoke edit wars. It is sufficient to say that certain features of the Religion of Evil can be found in historical religions of human history, either because of human error, context (including a lack of), etc. Moreover, there has never been a (mainstream) religion ''intentionally'' aiming at worshipping evil gods, with historical examples of GodOfEvil having people worshipping ''against'' them (most notably [[MythEgyptianMythology Apep]]).

[[noreallife]]'''Administrivia/NoRealLifeExamplesPlease''' This is a ''very'' controversial subject and likely to invoke edit wars. It is sufficient to say that certain features of the Religion of Evil can be found in historical religions of human history, either because of human error, context (including a lack of), etc.

** The Cult of Malik Nous, the Peacock Angel, in the alternate history novel ''Literature/ThePeshawarLancers''. It is the prevalent religion in the remains of Tsarist Russia following a meteor shower that destroys most of the northern hemisphere and involves the worship of the Slavic dark god Tchernabog, cannibalism and [[VirginPower virgins who can tell the future]] (to make matters worse, their powers eventually drive them to insanity, at which point they are taken away to become [[IncestIsRelative breeders for the next generation]]).

* Every [[EldritchAbomination Host]] for the Witch race in ''TabletopGame/BleakWorld'' has started their own, except for [[TokenGoodTeammate the Host of the Moon]], who only demands that you have consensual sex as an offering for power. Every one else demands [[PowerAtAPrice blood]] [[DealWithTheDevil sacrifice]] [[ImAHumanitarian or]] [[KillItWithFire worse]]

*** The religion [[OurOrcsAreDifferent Orks]] and [[AlwaysChaoticEvil Ocs]] of both settings is evil and simplistic. They follow the Gods Gork and Mork. One is cunningly brutal who will stab you in the back, while the other is brutally cunning who will stab you even when you are looking. The closest thing Orks have to theological debate is killing each other of which God is which. Worship of both Gods usually involves going around killing people and building [[HumongousMecha giant mechs]] in Gork's and Mork's image, which the Orks then use to kill people.

** The [[ComicBook/TeenTitans Church of Blood]]! Even Nightwing was a member at one point! Brainwashing was involved. ''All Hail Brother Blood!''
** There is also the Cult of Kobra, which controls a billion-dollar international crime syndicate and seeks to usher in the Kali Yuga (an "age of chaos") via terrorist attacks.
** Speaking of Kali, Ravan, a member of the Jihad and later the Suicide Squad, is a member of an extremist Thugee cult with an opposite mission - to ''delay'' the coming of Kali Yuga - by killing. Every time he kills, Ravan says "Another thousand years, Kali..."
** The unnamed group of evil-worshipping monks that trained Prometheus and gave him the key to enter an alternate dimension.
** Apokolips, where daily life for its billions of enslaved and brutalized denizens revolves around the endless, eternal worship of the resident despotic ruler and [[GodOfEvil god-emperor of tyranny]], the cruel and malevolent {{ComicBook/Darkseid}}. Some really evil villains from other parts of the cosmos worship him too- including the aforementioned Church of Crime.
** In ''Comicbook/BatmanTheBlackMirror'', Batman discovers an underground society named Mirror House run by a man named the Dealer who hosts auctions of super-villain objects as a way to celebrate the belief that cruelty and malevolence is humanity's "divine spark."

** [[Comicbook/DoctorStrange Dormammu]], the demon GodEmperor and SorcerousOverlord of the [[EldritchLocation Dark Dimension]] and the archetypal DimensionLord, derives part of his power from worship from throughout the cosmos and across multiple dimensions. He is the monotheistic god-tyrant of the Dark Dimension and all other dimensions he has conquered and merged with it, and is worshipped as a god in thousands of others. His goal is to [[MultiversalConqueror conquer the multiverse]] and turn life and afterlife into [[DystopiaJustifiesTheMeans a neverending torture camp for all eternity]], ruling over everything as the new God.
** [[Comicbook/DoctorStrange Shuma-Gorath]] is another demonic god-tyrant who is worshipped throughout the cosmos, but while Dormammu is "merely" the ruler of one dimension, Shuma-Gorath is the all-powerful ruler of over a hundred entire ''universes'' and is close to being TheOmnipotent for all the power he has. He is worshipped [[GodOfGods by gods of gods]] and once ruled the Earth in the distant past (twice) where he commanded human sacrifice. A seriously evil CosmicHorror and one of the most powerful villains in the entire Marvel cosmology.
** The ComicBook/GuardiansOfTheGalaxy had a StoryArc that culminated in the CrisisCrossover ''ComicBook/TheThanosImperative'' dealing with the Universal Church of Truth, originally founded by an evil, insane future version of Adam Warlock via time-travel. They believe in everlasting life, which doesn't sound bad until you learn this dimension is called the Cancerverse. They operate by the creed of "convert or die", and have armies fueled by their sheer, unrelenting faith in life to back that up, as [[LastOfHisKind Gamora]] can attest. And the Magus, their founder, takes control of them to summon [[EldritchAbomination the Many-Angled Ones]] into the main universe.
** In ''ComicBook/HeroesReborn2021'', America worships Mephisto - the big red devil of the Marvel Universe.
** ComicBook/{{Thanos}} himself is apparently a religious figure in a nihilistic cult he inspired / founded on an alien planet, headquarted in something called [[Creator/FriedrichNietzsche the Nietzsche institute]]. He doesn't bother to tell them when he decided that nihilism wasn't working for him anymore.
** ComicBook/NormanOsborn once headed a cult called the Brotherhood of the Scrier, which worshipped a nigh-omnipotent cosmic entity of the same name. The cult is an international criminal organization, but the Scrier himself is actually closer to a TrueNeutral and not that bad a guy- it is unclear if they know this, so if they assume he really is evil and worship him anyway then they are this trope, if mistakenly. One faction in particular counts more than most when they followed Osborn after he was kicked out and became the Cult of the Goblin.
** In ''ComicBook/UltimateXMen'', the Hellfire / Phoenix / [[spoiler:Shi'Ar]] religion is this, "saviour" of the universe by cleansing the current one.
** The Pride from the Runaways is one of the SecretCircleOfSecrets variety. They sacrifice young women to a trio of fallen angels who want to destroy all of humanity.
* The Church of Elvon in ''Nexus'' believes that all high technology increases energy consumption, and therefore increases entropy and accelerates the heat death of the universe. They therefore preach the overthrow of technological civilization by force. Violent, bloody, sadistic force. How this religion spread across the galaxy, well, hypocrisy is the tribute that virtue pays to vice?

* ''ComicBook/StarWarsLegacy'': While the various Sith Orders in Star Wars have gone through numerous iterations and generally only worship themselves, the comic introduces Darth Krayt and his One Sith, a cult run by the Dark Lord [[spoiler: formerly the fallen Jedi Asharrad Hett]] that teaches that all members of the Sith are a united entity following a singular vision, which in practice means they worship Krayt as much as anything else. This is so totally at odds with the openly selfish goals of the traditional Sith that the Holocrons of past Sith Lords declare Krayt a heretic and refuse to pass on their wisdom to him, but his reasoning is an attempt to put an end to the infighting that crippled previous Sith Orders precisely because they followed a strict SocialDarwinist path.

* In ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'', until its destruction Phyrexia (think equal parts CyberneticsEatYourSoul, BodyHorror, and TheLegionsOfHell) always had religious traits, with [[BigBad Yawgmoth]] at the head. These traits have been exaggerated by the [[http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/stf/137 white-mana faction]] of the reborn Phyrexia, calling itself the Machine Orthodoxy. In keeping with its Phyrexian nature, it really isn't very pleasant; the flaying and horrible mutilation of enemies and converts, gratuitous use of ritualized surgery, and [[OurAngelsAreDifferent stripping angels of their honour]] and [[FallenAngel turning them into sociopathic monsters]] all get four thumbs up from the average [[FanNickname Whiterexian]]. For added horror, white has [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=218058 Phyrexian Unlife]], which depicts [[UncannyValley an androgynous but most likely female porcelain mask looking at her newly-completed hands]]. And who do you do this to when you cast it? A [[{{mooks}} creature]]? No. Your opponent? No. You do it to ''yourself''.

* ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'' has the Healing Church. They are ultimately responsible for Yharnam's obsession with blood, seeking to spread the Old Blood that they had discovered in the defiled Pthumerian tombs under the city. When people started transforming into monsters when misusing the blood, rather than back down, they hid the connection so that their leaders, the Choir, could continue their ascension attempts. The main game sees the Choir turn innocent civilians into proto-Great One monsters, torch a section of the city when the plague got too bad, and encourage a vicious cyle of hunters turning into beasts, and clerics turning into the worst beasts of all. The DLC shows they did ''even worse''. [[spoiler: They had hunters specifically to kill anyone who found out their secrets, they turned the patients in the Astral Clocktower into malformed lumps of flesh, and the nightmare itself is a curse placed on them for the atrocities they committed against the Fishing Hamlet.]]
-->'''Simon, Seeker of Secrets''': Not a pretty sight, isn't it? The true face of the blood-woshipping, beast-purging Healing Church.

*** Bane is the God of Tyranny, Strife and Fear. His church was initially marked by sectarian violence that he encouraged and approved of, believing it [[TheSocialDarwinist culled the weak from the strong]], but when [[TopGod Ao]] declared that the power of a deity would now be tied to how many followers they actually ''had'', he shifted to a more orderly and hierarchical approach that promoted ambition, obedience, discipline and harsh punishments for those under their power. The Banite religion is the most popular of all the evil religions as it at least has the image of being "tough but fair" and promotes stability, but the ultimate goal of Bane and his church is WorldDomination and to destroy ''all'' other gods and churches who don't submit to Bane.

** These guys serve as the antagonists of the ''Valley of the Yetis'' DLC campaign. A rogue unit of the [[ArmiesAreEvil Royal Army]] (led by [[EvilPriest Master Sandesh]]) was sent by [[TheDragon Yuma Lau]] to find a mythical Relic with allegedly magical powers way up in the Himalayas, however they went mad and became a terrorist cult dedicated to Yalung. They occasionally kidnap unlucky travelers, and feed them to the [[BigfootSasquatchAndYeti monstrous Yeti beasts]] in [[HumanSacrifice the name of Yalung]].

** The Raven Queen also has a good bit of MySpeciesDothProtestTooMuch, as plenty of her worshippers are a bit overenthusiastic. (Shadar-kai especially tend to end up as random encounters.)

** ''TableTopGame/{{Pathfinder}}'' has a number of these. The Church of [[{{Satan}} Asmodeus]] controls [[TheEmpire Cheliax]], while their neighbour, Nidal, worships [[TortureTechnician Zon-Kuthon]]. Cultists of [[ProfessionalKiller Norgorber]], [[TheUndead Urgathoa]], [[MotherOfAThousandYoung Lamashtu]], and [[OmnicidalManiac Rovagug]] are distressingly common, both among society's outcasts, and the setting's various monsters. And that's without getting into the cults centred on various DemonLordsAndArchdevils, evil demigods, or gods forbid, [[HorsemenOfTheApocalypse The Four Horsemen]]. The Demon Lord [[KillerGorilla Angazahn]] in particular has a substantial following in the [[DarkestAfrica Mwangi Expanse]].

* In ''TabletopGame/MagicTheGathering'', until its destruction Phyrexia (think equal parts CyberneticsEatYourSoul, BodyHorror, and TheLegionsOfHell) always had religious traits, with [[BigBad Yawgmoth]] at the head. These traits have been exaggerated by the [[http://www.wizards.com/magic/magazine/Article.aspx?x=mtg/daily/stf/137 white-mana faction]] of the reborn Phyrexia, calling itself the Machine Orthodoxy. In keeping with its Phyrexian nature, it really isn't very pleasant; the flaying and horrible mutilation of enemies and converts, gratuitous use of ritualised surgery, and [[OurAngelsAreDifferent stripping angels of their honour]] and [[FallenAngel turning them into sociopathic monsters]] all get four thumbs up from the average [[FanNickname Whiterexian]]. For added horror, white has [[http://gatherer.wizards.com/Pages/Card/Details.aspx?multiverseid=218058 Phyrexian Unlife]], which depicts [[UncannyValley an androgynous but most likely female porcelain mask looking at her newly-compleated hands]]. And who do you do this to when you cast it? A [[{{mooks}} creature]]? No. Your opponent? No. You do it to ''yourself''.
** On the popular plane of Ravnica, there is also the Cult of Rakdos, a Black- and Red-mana aligned, murderous, hedonist cult dedicated to an ancient demon. What makes them stand out from other cults throughout Magic, however, is that the Cult of Rakdos is one of ten guilds whose existence is ''mandated'' by a plane-wide MagicallyBindingContract called the Guildpact. This means that not only are the other guilds magically-barred from taking large-scale action against them, but they're also able to operate more-or-less openly, and are the largest player in the plane's entertainment industry.

* ''WebVideo/AldriversDevourerOfCos'': The Church of the Tupperware, with [[OmnicidalManiac Joan Rivers]] as its creator and leader. She intends to use the chruch as a means to [[ApocalypseHow devour the entire world and then, the entire universe]].

** There are also the Sarkicists, another ApocalypseCult whose entire belief system is essentially HollywoodSatanism on steroids mixed with a twisted version of Gnosticism, as they regularly practice cannibalism, incest, HumanSacrifice, fleshcrafting magic, and [[DealWithTheDevil Faustian bargains]] in an attempt to [[GodhoodSeeker become gods]].

* In Christopher Ruocchio's ''The Suneater'' series, the vile alien Cielcins love cannibalism, mutilating their victims and making slaves out of captured survivors or waging genocidal attacks on planets of their enemies. Their culture developed in a such a way because they worship the EldritchAbomination known as the Other. And joining the Cielcin are human renegades who feel the Other is too mighty to withstand so they intend on surviving by having humanity debase themselves as a ServantRace to these Others.

* ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'' has the Healing Church. They are ultimately responsible for Yharnam's obsession with blood, seeking to spread the Old Blood that they had discovered in the defiled Pthumerian tombs under the city. When people started transforming into monsters when misusing the blood, rather than back down, they hid the connection so that their leaders, the Choir, could continue their ascension attempts. The main game sees the Choir turn innocent civilians into proto-Great One monsters, torch a section of the city when the plague got too bad, and encourage a vicious cyle of hunters turning into beasts, and clerics turning into the worst beasts of all. The DLC shows they did ''even worse''. [[spoiler: They had hunters specifically to kill anyone who found out their secretss, they turned the patientss in the Astral Clocktower into malformed lumps of flesh, and the nightmare itself is a curse placed on them for the atrocities they committed against the Fishing Hamlet.]]

* ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'' has the Healing Church. They are ultimately responsible for Yharnam's obsession with blood, seeking to spread the Old Blood that they had discovered in the defiled Pthumerian tombs under the city. When people started transforming into monsters when misusing the blood, rather than back down or change their ways, they only kept experimenting even more to further the changes, and perhaps interfering with the Great Ones' own personal plans for children through their utterly satanic lust and desire for power (although then again, it could also be interpreted that their actions were exactly what the Great One's counted on). Their clerics became the worst monsters of the lot, and their experiments worsened the already terrible situation from pure NightmareFuel into a full-blown CosmicHorrorStory with their demented desire to ascend. [[spoiler:The entire city and surroundings are also under the influence of TheMasquerade courtesy of a Great One named Rom, The Vacuous Spider, which hides the very truth as to what's really occurring in Yharnam and beyond and if that's not enough, ''The Old Hunters'' reveals that The Church also recruited assassins to eliminate (i.e '''MURDER''') those who came close to discovering the true secrets behind their worship and their experiments!]] While they initially started out as a CorruptChurch, its later actions pushed it squarely here. In short, ''Bloodborne'' is a CosmicHorrorStory where the cosmic horrors are significantly less evil than the humans obsessing over them.

** And of course, the Sable Church of Londor, worshippers of the Dark, eternal servants to the Primordial Serpents. They are still gleefully using abominable weapons like the Dark Hand and performing terrible rites in hopes of creating a Lord of Hollows to usurp the power of the First Flame and lead the world into the Dark.

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* ''VideoGame/{{Bloodborne}}'' has the Healing Church. They are ultimately responsible for Yharnam's obsession with blood, seeking to spread the Old Blood that they had discovered in the defiled Pthumerian tombs under the city. When people started transforming into monsters when misusing the blood, rather than back down or change their ways, they only kept experimenting even more to further the changes, and perhaps interfering with the Great Ones' own personal plans for children through their utterly satanic lust and desire for power (although then again, it could also be interpreted that their actions were exactly what the Great One's counted on). Their clerics became the worst monsters of the lot, and their experiments worsened the already terrible situation from pure NightmareFuel into a full-blown CosmicHorrorStory with their demented desire to ascend. [[spoiler:The entire city and surroundings are also under the influence of TheMasquerade courtesy of a Great One named Rom, The Vacuous Spider, which hides the very truth as to what's really occurring in Yharnam and beyond and if that's not enough, ''The Old Hunters'' reveals that The Church also recruited assassins to eliminate (i.e '''MURDER''') those who came close to discovering the true secrets behind their worship and their experiments!]] While they initially started out as a CorruptChurch, its later actions pushed it squarely here.