The Washington Post published an article on the morning of July 4
that had an interesting premise. It stated that if Facebook were a religion, it
would be the second most popular religion in the entire world.
That seems a bit far-fetched,
until you consider a few facts:
The most popular religion in the world is Islam, with 1.3 billion
adherents.
Close behind the religion of the Muslims is Roman Catholicism,
which has 1.2 billion followers. However, when grouped together with its many
variations (Lutheranism, Greek Orthodox etc.) Christianity jumps to the number
one spot, with 2.1 billion followers.
If you review the chart shown below, you’ll discover a few
surprises:
The THIRD most popular religion in the world (with 1.1 billion
“followers”) is “none of the above”, which translates into “non-believers”. In
all, there are 4300 religions practices around the world, including the Church
of the Flying Spaghetti Monster, which is considered a legitimate religion in
at least 2 countries in the world.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flying_Spaghetti_Monster
Although Facebook has only existed since 2004, it would be
considered a VERY successful company. As of today’s date, it has 2 billion
followers around the world, which technically would make it the world’s 2nd most
popular “religion”. However, in July of 2014, Facebook had 2.2 billion users (roughly
1/3 of the world’s population), which technically would have made it THE most
popular “religion” in the world,
To say that Mark Zuckerberg has done well in recent years is a
HUGE understatement. In January of this year, his net worth jumped by $5
billion, and it has increased rapidly since that time. As of today’s date, he
is worth $62.5 billion, which makes him the 5th richest man in
the entire world. It’s not hard to imagine him eventually passing Bill Gates to
become the richest person on the planet.
To put Zuckerberg’s wealth into perspective, consider this fact:
He is now 31 years old. If you added up the net worth of every
other individual in the United States who is 31 years old, their wealth would
be unlikely to be worth as much as Zuckerberg is all by himself. On top of all
that, he was Time magazine’s Person of the Year in 2010 – when he was 24 years
old.
As the article in Forbes magazine mentions, he and his wife plan
to give away 99% of his wealth during their lifetimes. Since he has founded an
LLC instead of a charitable trust, he has a lot more control over where his
money goes, which means that he could dwarf both the Koch brothers and Sheldon Adelman
on political donations, Although he would be considered a conservative by some
people, and a liberal by others, the notes under “politics” on his bio (see
Wikipedia article) seem to indicate that liberal causes have a strong edge in
his overall philosophy.
Zuckerber’s wife, Priscilla Chan Zuckerberg, is the daughter
of ethnic Chinese refugees who fled Vietnam in refugee boats. She graduated as
valedictorian of her high school class in Massachusetts, and graduated from
Harvard (where she met Zuckerberg) in 2007. She graduated from the University
of California (San Francisco) in 2012 with a medical degree, and is now a
licenses pediatrician. She is fluent in Cantonese, English, and Spanish, and is
the first person in her family to graduate from college. Her famous husband,
meanwhile, can read and write French, Hebrew, and ancient Greek, in addition to
his fluency in English.
We can argue until the cows come home about whether America is the
greatest country in the world (it isn’t) but where else could a young Jewish
boy from New York, and the daughter of immigrants, enjoy success beyond
the wildest imagination of even the most optimistic of our population?
Can I get an “amen”, brothers and sisters?
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