As a believer that Jesus is God and he controls the whole universe and the lives of all people, I am not too concerned about church membership percentages in a particular nation in history. Whoever God calls to be his children will follow him, and they will find each other. Jesus is the head of the church, and people who don't believe in him have no part in it. I would hope that unbelievers would hear the good news of Jesus and be drawn to him and have their hearts changed.
Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
391–400 of 1001 posts
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#392Earlier quoted context omitted.
Not just other commenters, the (sociological) science backs you up as well: political backlash is a big reason for recent disaffiliation. https://sociologicalscience.com/articles-vol1-24-423/
That’s the predictable, and in the end, best outcome. The most foolish thing cultural “christianity,” could do is pick a political party. Now that we’re a generation past that, the so-called “religious right” has evolved into a thin veneer of pseudo-religion over a very specific political faction, and that shallow falseness is driving most people away. As for actual Christianity and those who study it, in many ways t…
I emigrated from another country to the US and, having participated in religion in the past (even if just for socialization), became frightened to discover that American churches (at least 90% of them) are nothing more than a cover to conservative political activism. I never entered into a single one after that.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#393Earlier quoted context omitted.
I've talked to people of the younger generations (in the USA) who are not even aware that there is anything other than fundamentalist literalism. Either the Earth is 6000 years old and Jonah literally rode in the belly of a whale, or there is no God. This sets up a situation where you have to be willfully ignorant or lie to defend the existence of God, since this stuff is bollocks. In reality fundamentalist literalis…
> In reality fundamentalist literalism is a relatively recent (19th century) theological development I was under the impression that it began with the Protestant Reformation - specifically Calvinism (16th century)
Hmm... my answer may have been US-centric. I was thinking of this kind of thing:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Fundamentals
Early 20th century though, but the antecedents go back to the 19th.
This is regarded by some as the foundational text of 20th century American fundamentalism. Written and published by an oil tycoon, of course.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#394So many of the comments here are affirming what I have long observed: much anti-religious sentiment (“much”, not “all”!) is actually a reaction to fundamentalism, which is the bad theology of scriptural literalism, which brings heresies like hating LGBT, insisting the Bible is also a science textbook, superstitious views of certain Middle Eastern lands, and more. Growing up as a mainline Protestant, I thankfully didn…
For me, and many I know, anti-religious sentiment is pretty simple. We just think it is science fiction, and thus not good to believe it is real. Even if its all very nice and friendly and reasonable fiction, it is better to understand it isn't real.
My anti-religious sentiment goes far beyond that. I could not care less if people believe in science fiction. We all believe lies, don't we?
My problem is that religions dictate universal truth, which is used as a justification to oppress. Many of us were abused or oppressed by mainstream religons as children.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#395Earlier quoted context omitted.
> This is, consistently, what I hear from friends and family as to why they have drifted away from the Catholic church, and is solidly my own reason as well. I was raised Catholic and decided, as a teenager, that I didn't want to be Catholic as an adult. > My theory is that people have always felt that way, but it was harder to nail down these awful people before social media. IMO, two things: 1: The changes in the 1…
At least the abortion thing makes sense: Catholics believe that the soul enters the body at the moment of conception, so abortion is effectively murder. It would be odd for the church to not openly oppose it.
> Catholics believe that the soul enters the body at the moment of conception,
They don't, though, or at least they didn't always. No less a Church authority than Saint Thomas Aquinas said ensoulment didn't happen before quickening. The total prohibition on abortion is a relatively recent theological innovation, and this insistence that it has always been thus is one of the things above mentioned that leaves a bad taste in people's mouths can they can plainly see it isn't true.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#396Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is a "good person?" And do you really think people who believe in God are just listening to "fairy tails (sic)" so they can be face the reality of death? Is that really the best portrayal of Christians you can come up with?
Not OP, but yes, I think that any consumer of organized religion is doing it because fairy tales are easier than life and death is scary. That is all it really is, right?
Not all religions posit an afterlife.
Though, I guess a meaningless death is scarier than death, and nearly all religions are attempts to form meaning in life when there's no empirically obvious meaning.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#397Earlier quoted context omitted.
What is a "good person?" And do you really think people who believe in God are just listening to "fairy tails (sic)" so they can be face the reality of death? Is that really the best portrayal of Christians you can come up with?
> What is a "good person?" I know why you are asking this, but honestly it's a silly question. Most humans have empathy. Most humans know "things and people that hurt others are bad. Humans helping others are good". For the few that don't, we've got legal codes built on the same principles. The bible has very little morality in it that's "good" and a lot of really questionable moral statements. For example, beating s…
>No, I have come to divide people against each other! 52 From now on families will be split apart, three in favor of me, and two against—or two in favor and three against."
This is somewhat oblique to the point you're making, but I find a lot of bible passages totally incomprehensible. What is Jesus saying here? That families will likely be for or against him, and that families will consist of 5 members, and each family will have an uneven split? (2-3 vs 3-2) It seems like a very pedantic and odd way to make the point I believe the author is trying to make. Does this rely on an old colloquialism? Is there some reason it's phrased so strangely? Would it not have sounded strange to contemporary ears?
I actually had a bit of a shock when I finally read old Greek writing: Herodotus, Plato, etc. Everything they write is meant to be clearly an precisely understood. Depending on the translation, the writing feels simple and modern. I had naively expected all old writing to be like the bible: incomprehensible, metaphorical, nonsensical.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#398Earlier quoted context omitted.
Growing up in the 80's (UK) as a Roman Catholic, I remember the services being full on Sunday mornings. Not been since I left home at 18, because frankly I stopped believing in God the same time I stopped believing in Father Christmas (7?). The only reason I went was to make my parents happy. Now I'm in my 40's I do wonder if the lack of religion in society is leading us to a bad place. We know from numerous studies…
where is the pull for good old family values? That's a term that everyone interprets their own way, without even realising that they have different values to the person standing next to them; different people's "family values" can conflict in significant and very incompatible ways. So what are "good old family values"? If your young, unmarried daughter falls pregnant, should you cast her out or should you double-down…
Good old family values would discourage young, unmarried women from getting pregnant in the first place. That is absolutely not how society works today, so let's start there instead of your absurd example.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#399Late 30s here who was dragged to church by parents and grandparents but who isn't exposing our kids to religion. It’s pretty straightforward for us: you don’t need fairy tales to be a good person and to come to terms with death (which comes for everyone). “Be happy, be kind.” If others choose to observe, that’s their choice.
I agree, but beware that many people end up filling a religion shaped hole with other things. look at how many of our fellow atheists have joined the church of social justice. adhering to a new kind of religion and dogma. things you can't say, heretics who must be cast out, good vs evil, original sin, preachers, zealots, self flagellation. it's all there, except for a path to redemption. https://reason.com/2020/06/29…
I think that at some level you need a belief system. There will always be things beyond us, so at some level the only thing we can do is guess. But we shouldn't let those guesses dominate our life and we should re-evaluate them completely, say, at least every decade.
Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time
#400So many of the comments here are affirming what I have long observed: much anti-religious sentiment (“much”, not “all”!) is actually a reaction to fundamentalism, which is the bad theology of scriptural literalism, which brings heresies like hating LGBT, insisting the Bible is also a science textbook, superstitious views of certain Middle Eastern lands, and more. Growing up as a mainline Protestant, I thankfully didn…
I'm not sure the narrative you're trying to paint here actually works. If you dig deeper into the actual poll, it says:
> In addition to Protestants, declines in church membership are proportionately smaller among political conservatives, Republicans, married adults and college graduates. These groups tend to have among the highest rates of church membership, along with Southern residents and non-Hispanic Black adults.
From the actual first-party news article on the poll: https://news.gallup.com/poll/341963/church-membership-falls-...
For better or worse, conservative (both politically and theologically) people seem to be holding on to their Christian faith in greater numbers (at least marginally) than their more progressive or liberal leaning counterparts.
Anyway, as someone who almost left the faith, I would agree with the overall narrative that Christianity became ineffective in the late 20th century. Personally though, I would attribute it to a lack of focus on youth and issues relevant to youths. I can't find it now, but I'm pretty sure I saw a poll that indicated most people who leave do so in the transition from high school to college. That certainly lines up with what I observed, most people just didn't care enough to keep going (regardless of what branch they were in). I would have been one of them myself, if I hadn't been able to find a college Christian community that was dramatically more vibrant than what I grew up with. But overall I think I'm one of the lucky ones.