Due to centuries of cultural exchange there are a lot of similarities between the hamster religion and that of the chipmunks, both now being functionally death cults. The root of where they differ is how the two religions view this holy death.
To hamsters, death is an art form, an ever-ascending pillar of the strange and the grotesque. Hamsters seek beauty and uniqueness in death, venerating the most outlandish of the dead as saints: Our Lady of the Plumbing, Saint Tim the Blended, and Saint Ms. Cupcake Who Got Into That Barrel of Degreaser, to name a few. Through death, they connect with their god, whose immense corpse formed the world after choking to death on a stray asteroid. Hamsters will spend weeks planning their deaths and awaiting an opportunity to swan dive off this mortal coil.
Chipmunks follow a warrior’s religion. While hamsters embraced humanity as creators of new and exciting shapes and poisons, chipmunks never forsook their wild ways. Chipmunk culture idealizes the divine struggle: to face insurmountable odds and to die with honor. Only by throwing themselves under the wheels of a moving vehicle can they earn their reincarnation and escape the cruel jaws of the fox-god who awaits them in the underworld. Every chipmunk goes to their death secure in the knowledge that they have faced their fate a million times before and that they will face it a million times again.
Squirrel religion does not speak of death.