“Peasant religion” is a pejorative term for “folk religion” in its second meaning below. It is most likely characteristic of the majority of those who identify themselves as a member of any world religion. Because structured religion is commonly a public utility easily available to the paying public and because religious leaders generally require of their flocks little or no understanding of their scriptures, doctrines, and various rituals, peasant religion flourishes; it thrives in unorganized fashion among otherwise educated people within mainstream traditions (e.g., the Episcopal and Roman Catholic Churches). Members of the highest judiciaries, legislative and executive bodies of world governments have been exposed only to the most naïve and uninformed levels of religious education, which usually came to an end in early adolescence if not before. They are in the same league religiously with most university professors and corporate executives. Moreover, nearly all do not have a clue that there is a more sophisticated and learned dimension to their heritages. They have taken for granted that they have comprehended their tradition more than adequately – which reinforces and perpetuates the peasant level quality.
The following entry is from the Oxford Dictionary of World Religions (1997).
“Folk religion. 1. Religion which occurs in small, local communities which does not adhere to the norms of large systems. Folk-urban typology was developed by Robert Redfield as a basis for the comparison of societies, and for the study of urbanization. Folk society is 'small, isolated, nonliterate and homogeneous, with a strong sense of group solidarity ... Behaviour is traditional, spontaneous, uncritical and personal.... Kinship, its relationships and institutions, are the type categories of experience, and the familial group is the unit of action. The sacred prevails over the secular.' Folk religion is thus much studied by anthropologists.
“2. In a wider sense, folk religion is the appropriation of religious beliefs and practices at a popular level. This may occur as much in urban as in rural environments, and may also be the way in which individuals or groups belonging to mainstream religions practise their religion: it may be at considerable variance from what is officially supposed to be the case, and is thus also referred to as non-official religion. In this sense, folk religion absorbs much that might be frowned upon by official religion. It is extremely eclectic, and picks up elements from popular culture, superstition, sentiment, the paranormal, the occult, astrology, etc., and it is characteristically unorganized. Nevertheless, it can form systems of belief and practice, as in the cult of Elvis Presley, whose home at Gracelands has become a shrine: see further NEW RELIGIOUS MOVEMENTS. Folk religion expresses the deep *religiosity which exists naturally in most people, and is therefore closely allied to implicit religion.”