I'm thinking about adding a religion into one of the series I'm writing. Problem is, as a Christian, I always found it hard to read about heroes taking down fanatical churches and the like in books, as I felt they were poking fun at monotheism. Then again, I'm worried if I try to base this religion on mine, I'll sound like a heretic XD
How can I approach this topic from an objective and unbiased viewpoint?
Well the thing about monotheism in our world at least is that all the respective religions are similar in their core message. Here on Earth we obviously have Christianity, and Islam (which together make up about 65% of the world's population) and Judaism. All three have in common obviously the one God thing, but also all three religions acknowledge some of the same historical figures like Abraham and Jesus, the Quran references many of the same people/events as the Bible and the Torah is the first 5 books of the old testament. So it's fair to say they all have the same origin and have diverged from that, really Christianity was a revolution on Judaism and then Islam kinda sprang out of Christianity. If you were to use earth's monotheistic religions as model you'd probably end up with something along the lines of
There is one God and he is all powerful, existing outside of space and time he is eternal and the creator of all things, he designed the world and mankind to love and serve him as he loves and serves them. Every soul is immortal but ever body is temporary, after the soul leaves the body and realm of world the soul will be judged according to how selfishness it served others and God and if deemed worthy will be sent to a place of everlasting joy, if not a place of everlasting damnation (and heres the part where I'll kick Christianity out and just go with Islam and Judaism's ideas) a person must do many works to earn a place in the good after life as a reward for their deeds
BUT since this is your own world you don't have to base it on our world religions,
the only real requirements is the presence of only one God who is all powerful (so no other gods or supernatural forces to assist them) and by proxy that God created all the the things that are. but unlike our religions your disciples don;t have to believe that God is good, or loving, or they could believe he can only be connected through rituals or mediums or even summoned into a physical form. They don't need to believe in two opposite afterlives, they could believe in many or not at all and unlike our monotheists' afterlife the ones you make may not be forever as in you can 'serve your time' in one and then move to another or back to earth.
the sky's the limit
I know that was all really vague but I love theology and would be happy to offer more help if you need it.
Thanks a lot, I'll definitely think about it