The word religion is extremely rare in the New Testament

[soso]

The word religion is extremely rare in the New Testament or the writings of mystics. 

The reason is simple. 

[Those attitudes and practices //to which we give the collective name of religion] are themselves concerned with religion hardly at all.

To be religious is to have one’s attention /fixed on God and on one’s neighbor in relation to God.

Therefore, almost by definition, a religious man, or a man /when he is being religious, is not thinking about religion;

he hasn’t the time.

Religion is [what we (or he himself at a later moment) call his activity /from outside].

From The World's Last Night