Is Religion Actually Psychology?

No, although the question might have been better posed had it read "is organised religion actually psychology?". There is a long and deeply depressing history of states and religious establishments utilising deep psychological trauma in order to control adherents/citizens. The trouble is that a lot of people confuse religion, which to my mind is a deeply held personal belief in something, with organised religion, which inevitably requires a large degree of control and bureaucracy in order to survive.

To give a brief example, the Catholic Church (I am a lapsed Catholic) that developed in the late Roman Empire period through to the monolith we witness today has absolutely nothing in common with the early churches founded following the death of Jesus. Indeed, the Apostles would have reacted with utter horror had they been around to witness the finery, riches, and flummery that is associated with the modern church - most of them had absolutely nothing, barely the ragged clothes on their backs. 

lazland wrote: To give a brief example, the Catholic Church (I am a lapsed Catholic) that developed in the late Roman Empire period through to the monolith we witness today has absolutely nothing in common with the early churches founded following the death of Jesus. Indeed, the Apostles would have reacted with utter horror had they been around to witness the finery, riches, and flummery that is associated with the modern church - most of them had absolutely nothing, barely the ragged clothes on their backs.

Let me add to this that Christians of the early church were to die for Christ- not kill for him. 

If you look very carefully at history though, it wasn't Christianity per se that advocated the horrors often associated with Christianity- recall that in Rome, Christianity was a persecuted sect for quite some time. It wasn't until government picked up religion as a tool for its own ends that things really began to get nasty.

Two examples that immediately spring to mind are Emperor Constantine's political maneuvering in 313 and Byzantine Emperor Alexius I's plea for help in 1095 that eventually led to the first Crusade- interesting because Alexius I had been excommunicated by Gregory VII and so had to reconcile with the Catholic Church first at the Council of Piacenza.

Since religion doesn't make any hypothesis about the mind and then try to test them, I'm going to say no.

Religion is culture and  insures the history of man is interchangeable with the history of war

^no comment

.....and psychology is a religion....end of thread

Prog=Religion

Ok here's the serious version.

People actually saying that one is like the other worries me. I though we all knew at least a little bit of something here on PA... 

I would have said sociology rather than psychology for religion per se, whereas psychology would have more to do with the nature of the belief itself than the religion that supports it,