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Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

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Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#871

Post by worker767424 »

CedarMills wrote: post #93

As a believer and someone who attends church regularly, this is sad but not unexpected. From my own personal experience - if the church cannot answer questions clearly, their members will look for answers somewhere else. A lot of churches unfortunately are so elementary in their teaching or turn to "feel good preaching" (see Elevation Church). The longterm effect is that a person ends up being tired of getting the sa…

Some people go to church for answers, but I think a lot are really just there for the community and play along with the religious parts because of inertia.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#872

Post by bckr »

simplerman wrote: post #849
CodeGlitch wrote: post #167

Earlier 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…

> In modern no-religion societies, where is the pull for good old family values? What we are seeing is better rights and fairness for individuals (same-sex marriage, etc) but is that good for society as a whole? I understand where you are coming from, I struggle with my atheism/beliefs too. But without doubt, this is good for society. Think about it, we had slavery because bible and other religions, approved of slave…

I wouldn't say that religion caused these ills. Religion was used to justify these ills.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#873

Post by rajivjain »

The Economist published article in this week's edition contrasting the rise of the current left/right fervor to relative decline of the religious fervor. The accompanying image captures this really well - https://www.economist.com/img/b/1000/563/90/sites/default/fi....

The full article is here -https://www.economist.com/united-states/2021/03/27/religious...

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#874

Post by lalaland1125 »

rajivjain wrote: post #873

The Economist published article in this week's edition contrasting the rise of the current left/right fervor to relative decline of the religious fervor. The accompanying image captures this really well - https://www.economist.com/img/b/1000/563/90/sites/default/fi... . The full article is here - https://www.economist.com/united-states/2021/03/27/religious...

I'm not sure this is actually that good of an explanation. Europe has much lower levels of church attendance and doesn't have heavily partisan politics.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#875

Post by worker767424 »

drumttocs8 wrote: post #364
CedarMills wrote: post #93

As a believer and someone who attends church regularly, this is sad but not unexpected. From my own personal experience - if the church cannot answer questions clearly, their members will look for answers somewhere else. A lot of churches unfortunately are so elementary in their teaching or turn to "feel good preaching" (see Elevation Church). The longterm effect is that a person ends up being tired of getting the sa…

I grew up in a church that was very serious about "serious" preaching- Primitive Baptist, very focused on Calvinist doctrine and what could be considered scriptural literalism. It was definitely not "baby food"... but they still could not answer some questions clearly, and that is because it is an invention of man rooted in a prescientific understanding of the world. I would argue that church are losing members not b…

This is what it was smart for the Catholic church to have to issues with evolution. Maintaining a strict creationist stance just gets sillier and sillier over time.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#876

Post by cassepipe »

I think astrology is the new religion taking over the world. So many people I know are into it right now, it's unbelievable. All explain-everything religions tend to end up incompatible with modern life if there isn't a nation state or compact community to support them. Astrology has less broad claims on explaining how the world works but seems to provide a lazy framework to think about people, to explain "Why are people doing what they do"? In this sense we really live in a post modern world : No grand narrative seems to be taking root any more.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#877

Post by [deleted] »

ben509 wrote: post #860
RankingMember wrote: post #729

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Do you also not take Alan Turing's works seriously?

I discount Turing's works because of his suicide. I think the Turing award ought to be renamed. Consider all the love and respect directed at Robin Williams after he died. The perverse reality is that for someone in a suicidal frame of mind, that kind of love makes "I'd be better off dead" far more credible. I think the other extreme, outright condemning someone, probably doesn't work either, as it's liable to make a…

[deleted]

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#878

Post by encryptluks2 »

giantg2 wrote: post #318
Applejinx wrote: post #171

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The OP says 'U.S.'. US churches ARE political groups, in practical terms.

Any organization is political. The difference is whether we are talking about the organization or the members. Most members are not that politically involved. There are plenty of people who are very religious and participate in the religious ceremonies. If these people no longer had that, it's possible some of them would move into material participation in political parties, offices, etc.

Or they may join a band, or choir, or local sporting team, or organize/join an event on meetup. While some of these may be political they are often much less political than a church.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#879

Post by alexashka »

chmod600 wrote: post #781
rmah wrote: post #687

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In that quote, Wallace is just morphing, conflating, and fudging the definition of the word "worship". He says people "worship" (with a variety of subtly different meanings) a variety of things and then, implies that because we can use the same word, "worship", to describe those activities, they are equivalent. I despise this rhetorical technique. I find it both insulting, intellectually dishonest and useless.

It is not logically rigorous, but it illustrates a point. Can you expand on why the distinction you are drawing is important?

Because the absence of logical rigor is what enables charlatans to continue to make a living off of people's desire to believe in something that is not so.

This is a problem that's bigger than religion - when people can't tell when they're being bullshitted to or when they use emotion instead of reason to decide on matters that significantly affect their lives and lives of others (not just which flavor of icecream to have), it's a problem.

Re: Gallup: U.S. church membership dips below 50% for first time

#880

Post by throwawaymanbot »

lalaland1125 wrote: post #874
rajivjain wrote: post #873

The Economist published article in this week's edition contrasting the rise of the current left/right fervor to relative decline of the religious fervor. The accompanying image captures this really well - https://www.economist.com/img/b/1000/563/90/sites/default/fi... . The full article is here - https://www.economist.com/united-states/2021/03/27/religious...

I'm not sure this is actually that good of an explanation. Europe has much lower levels of church attendance and doesn't have heavily partisan politics.

Europe does not have FOX News/Hard Right Outrage factory spewing 24/7 either.
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