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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

#181

Post by Applejinx »

speeder wrote: post #100
Applejinx wrote: post #3

Now let's tax churches, like Frank Zappa suggested :)

I am from Brazil... To be honest this would be a complete disaster here. 1. My city main hospital, belongs to Catholic Church, same applies to many other cities. 2. Many of our leading universities, doing research and important work, belong to Catholic Church, notably PUC-RIO, the creators of Lua language. 3. Protestant churches here are the major organizations driving away drug dealers, some took the donations to bu…

Bear in mind that the OP says US (not Brazil). I can't speak to conditions in Brazil, and don't intend to cast aspersions. When I say 'let's', the 'us' is Americans, specifically United States. Our experience isn't entirely the same as yours.

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

#182

Post by drewg123 »

I used to think that the lower church membership went, the better off we'd be as a nation, because we'd be more rational on average. I still think so, but I'm less hopeful now. The events of the last few years have called that idea into question, as the rampant irrationality that I used to associate with fundamentalists seems to have moved from the pulpit to the airwaves and now to social media.

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

#183

Post by randomopining »

Obviously the overrated part of church is the ceremony and mystique, and the past wrongs of the church.

The underrated part is the sense of community and communal energy... which even though I'm agnostic, I envy, and would consider going some day.

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

#184

Post by CedarMills »

49531 wrote: post #152
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…

As someone who was raised in a religious home who no longer attends any church I think it's less to do with not answering questions and more to do with a hostile rejection of religion generally. It wasn't until I had children of my own that I realized I needed to distance myself from religion. I know there is a large variety of what is taught from religion to religion and sect to sect but I'd like to steer clear from…

I think it heavily depends on the church and community. One of the reasons we are staying in our current church is because we're open to a wide community (multi-ethnic) with the same core values. Our kids grow up in this community but at the end of the day, it will be their decision if they decide to no longer attend.

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

#185

Post by derwiki »

ryneandal wrote: post #62
gabythenerd wrote: post #4

I am impressed that numbers are that high, looking from the outside the US doesn't look particularly religious. It might be lower still, I don't think young people answer cellphone surveys all that much.

Much of the heartland is _very_ religious. Drive across the country and in the flyover states you'll see A LOT of anti-abortion/sin billboards.

“Hell is Real” was always my fave

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

#186

Post by justaman »

toomuchtodo wrote: post #145

Late 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.

It goes beyond fairy tails. There is a sense of community that (for the most part) only religion has been able to maintain in the information age.

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

#187

Post by mustafa_pasi »

p_l wrote: post #125
rbanffy wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> But the fact that admission to this community required total philosophical adherence is just bizarre. My grandpa's best friend was a catholic priest. I remember him saying that you really don't need to go to the church if you don't want to, but, if you did good deeds selflessly, always tried to make things right (in the sense of least global damage possible) and to avoid wronging others, you'd be a good enough cato…

It's also the official doctrine of Catholic Church since Vatican II... Thing is, application of it by clergy is not exactly universal :(

Not really. If you are, muslim yes. But if you are Catholic, then one of your duties is mass every Sunday and not doing so is a mortal sin.

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

#189

Post by paulryanrogers »

AuthorizedCust wrote: post #102

So 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…

After being raised in a non-Fundamentalist denomination I'd say the progressive ones are more insidious and no less harmful. Their foundations are all the same text, no matter how literal or figurative they interpret it. IME they usually also teach the same bad ways of thinking: emotion over logic, testimony over hard evidence, authority beyond your understanding, etc.

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

#190

Post by avasylev »

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…

Could you please share which churches you think have solid theology?
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