Way before the rise of capitalism, religious leaders of any given society were (almost, always) part of the ruling class.

In feudal society, for example, this is expressed in the phrase: "Lords Temporal and Lords Spiritual.???

Meanwhile, in the course of breaking the earthly power of feudal lords, capitalist revolutionaries also broke the power of the spiritual lords. Indeed, if you go back and look at what some of the 18th century radical bourgeois ideologues wrote, they really were nearly as hostile to religion as I am.

 Capitalist class of today has changed a lot. Not only do they confer special privileges on successfully established religions "tax breaks" for example but also they seem to be increasingly attracted to religious "explanations" for objective social phenomena.

When the neo-conservative reactionaries call for a return to "traditional American values,??? they seem to mean a society in which religious concerns played an enormous role in determining public policy.

The core value of all successful religions is, of course, obedience to authority. This is what the believing masses were always instructed to do.

As a result, either religion has always been a ruling class "tool" or otherwise parts of the ruling class itself.

In addition, when there is a proletarian revolution and new popular organs of self-determination are established, you can be sure that some of those opportunistic vermin will crawl out from under their rocks with their "boilerplate offer": you make the people worship our way and we will make the faithful obey you.

The communist answer is no. Make that Hell no!