You're conflating what's popular with what works. Just because something is popular among most people doesn't mean it works for most people. It just means they think it's working. Given their often small sample sizes and only circumstantial evidence for drawing that conclusion, it shouldn't be too surprising that a lot of people are doing things that don't work for them.
It seems that it is often the case that people are doing things that work for them for reasons they don't necessarily understand. For example, one of the great benefits of church is that you meet a lot of people of the same general culture, economic status, and belief system... which is good for networking and dating. Likewise, prayer seems to be a fairly effective self-regulation/self-calming system. (Contrariwise, Religion has had comparatively limited success in dealing with large-scale political/ethical issues and personal risk-management ("Jesus,...
If it's worth saying, but not worth its own post (even in Discussion), then it goes here.
Notes for future OT posters:
1. Please add the 'open_thread' tag.
2. Check if there is an active Open Thread before posting a new one. (Immediately before; refresh the list-of-threads page before posting.)
3. Open Threads should be posted in Discussion, and not Main.
4. Open Threads should start on Monday, and end on Sunday.