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Essay Outline: 

	Thesis: Faith has always had an extreme affect on society, regardless of how secular their culture may be. 

Background Paragraph: 

Topic: The effects religion has had on cultures is immense, religion itself has created wars and allies. 
Religion has directly or indirectly caused the fall of great empires. 
Promises using religion have been made to make a profit (middle ages, priests promised people less time in purgatory if they made a donation). 
Religion was more important to people in bad times (or people who were poor) because it was the only chance of relief from their lives) balance of man and god. For instance during a strong philosophical time, like classical athens, the focus was Man, not god. During the middle ages, it was God not man.