As for the religious movement idea, I think the environmentalist movement is as much as a "religious" movement as Christianity. Environmentalism is obviously not a religion, but for right wing pundits or commentators, the analogy is often made.
Ooh, hey--this reminded me of one of my favorite sermons, which I haven't done in quite a while.
Let's take environmentalism, since you mentioned it. Why is environmentalism a good thing? Somebody would probably reply, hypothetically, "because it's best to preserve the natural world for our benefit, even if the economy suffers a little as a result". To which one can ask: "well, why is the natural world more important than the economy"? And the environmentalist would answer: "because quality of life is more important than money". To which one can ask: "why is quality of life more important than money"?
Note that the chain of counter-questions just keeps going further and further back. No matter how many answers you spout at me, I can always reply to that answer with another question:
WHY? And this is just a single example on one issue.
The truth is, ALL issues are the same way (at least, I've never found a counterexample). The chain of reasons for doing something cannot be infinite; there must be one idea at the very beginning that HAS no logical explanation, it simply Is. In short, any political philosophy--environmentalism, the Drug War, the War on Terror, abortion, gay rights, religious rights, the Right To Life--must always begin with an act of Faith.
