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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

#661

Post by Breza »

mixmastamyk wrote: post #641
nikolay wrote: post #631

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's weird how many Americans are completely unaware of the second largest branch of Christianity (or better call it "the trunk" and everything else - "a branch") - the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is the original Christianity without a pope, indulgences, inquisition, and other things, which have nothing to do with the early Christianity.

Yes, also Christians in the US are mostly Protestants, which purposely moved away from the things you mentioned.

I'm a Lutheran and I've studied the works of Luther. When I learned about the Orthodox church as an adult, I really liked what I saw. If Luther had been an Orthodox priest, I wonder if he would have launched his gentle rebellion (and, later, his not-so-gentle rebellion).

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

#662

Post by Noos »

brundolf wrote: post #348
ramraj07 wrote: post #280

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Stance on abortion among your brothers in church? As if brothers should even have one that matters? 2. Do you follow the edict that if you’re not baptist then by definition you go to hell? How do you reconcile this with having friends or anyone at all you care about who are then going to hell? Point is, I’m not sure there is any middle ground that’s acceptable. I don’t come here as an atheist, just as someone who’…

> Point is, I’m not sure there is any middle ground that’s acceptable. I grew up fundamentalist, then swung hard atheist, then ended up, as one friend who went to seminary described it, "the most christian atheist he's ever met". I've known Christians ignorant and intellectual, hateful and openly loving, urban and rural, liberal and conservative, and everything in-between. Here's my take: A healthy faith is not about…

I grew up being bullied by people because I was different. I was a mess honestly, a weird, smelly kid who was a bit of an eyesore. These are people who were nice to each other, and people who would have been seen as caring, loving and kind people to their families and others that liked them. I was even mocked by one of my teachers.

Very few people think they are not forgiving, loving and caring. Many people will open the book, find the things that reassure them they are loving, caring, and a wise person, and close it happy.

Your friends don't try to convert you because they hide themselves around you. If they tried, you would cut them out of your life, despite your empathy; just mentioning that you will pray for someone can make them angry. If they persisted, really believing their friend was in danger of losing eternal life, you would end the friendship.

Really, all the stuff you say sounds nice, but secular people only show love to people who they think are lovable. When you become one of the unlovables, they will cheerfully drop what you say and bring out the knives, and your philosophy is worthless to stop it.

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

#663

Post by UweSchmidt »

legitster wrote: post #542

This misses the forest for the trees: Membership is down at organizations across the board - scouting, group athletics, Rotary clubs, unions, even things like PTAs and neighborhood associations and model train clubs. There is a society wide "apathy" event happening right under our noses. Maybe we're just seeing a new generation moving to new niche groups that aren't being seen yet. But it seems that technology is doi…

Our "communal bonds" are being replaced by 1-to-n relationships between influencers, streamers, content providers and their "followers".

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

#664

Post by billti »

kongolongo wrote: post #483
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…

The reason fundamentalists are so appealing is because they at least try to maintain some level of consistency. How does one know which parts of the bible to accept or which parts are metaphor and which parts are literal or which version of the bible to believe? At least the most literal interpretation always tries to be consistent. What makes any interpretation better than scriptural literalism? Is it the fact that…

Totally agree. I'm not religious at all, but at least being a "fundamentalist" seems intellectually honesty. If you believe your religious text is the true word of an all powerful God, surely it's infallible? What gives you the right to pick and choose which parts to take literally or not?

Would an all powerful God who wants "true believers" to find salvation leave them for thousands of years muddling through with just an ambiguous and inconsistent book to live by?

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

#665

Post by thrww20210329 »

dawg- wrote: post #336
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…

I became an atheist/agnostic as a teenager and now in my late 20's I have slowly come back to religion. So I am really interested in this topic. My comment is specifically about online atheist communities, because I think they are often toxic to both religion and to atheism itself. A lot of these communities are hyper-focused on fundamentalism, to their own detriment. These online atheists communities can be very unf…

"As a religious person, it is a bit frustrating that you never see atheists confronting the great theologists and religious philosophers"

They also conveniently ignore miracles sent from God and seen by thousands of people: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Miracle_of_the_Sun

"you are pro choice"

I'm sorry but that is not compatible with Christianity.

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

#666

Post by nyghtly »

lootsauce wrote: post #606

“Because here's something else that's weird but true: in the day-to day trenches of adult life, there is actually no such thing as atheism. There is no such thing as not worshipping. Everybody worships. The only choice we get is what to worship. And the compelling reason for maybe choosing some sort of god or spiritual-type thing to worship—be it JC or Allah, be it YHWH or the Wiccan Mother Goddess, or the Four Noble…

Here's the full speech for anyone who took an interest in this excerpt: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8CrOL-ydFMI

In my opinion, it's one of the best graduation speeches of all time.

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

#667

Post by throwawaygal7 »

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…

Original anabaptists were not calvinists... primitive baptists are inherently unserious

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

#668

Post by NortySpock »

hkarthik wrote: post #563
brobdingnagians wrote: post #535

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And yet our society is more polarized than ever. From your anecdote, one would think that declining religion would result in peace and love overflowing in society, but we see the opposite. Public morality cannot be maintained without religion; we will sadly see the end result of that in coming years.

It's an interesting argument that you lay out, and as agnostic that came from a religious family, it's something that I've personally grappled with. In the absence of religion, where do people find their moral and ethical compass? I wasn't raised atheist, and when I ask atheists this question they often dismiss it as not important or obvious. I feel like that's half the reason religion persists, because they actually…

> Where do people find their moral and ethical compass?

I agree that atheists cannot point to a single book that everyone should use to define their moral and ethical compass, but I do think that utilitarianism (either act-based: "we should act always so as to produce the greatest good for the greatest number" or rule based: "we ought to live by rules that, in general, are likely to lead to the greatest good for the greatest number") provides a healthy starting framework.

Utilitarianism: Crash Course Philosophy #36 (10 min) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-a739VjqdSI

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

#669

Post by Breza »

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…

It's so refreshing to see somebody who has had a similar experience to my own. I've never been a member of a church like the ones that people describe in a lot of the comments. We focus on devotion to God and improving the earth. For example, here's how we marked our church's 100th birthday:

https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/on-its-100th-birthday-a...

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

#670

Post by dragonwriter »

nikolay wrote: post #631
anonAndOn wrote: post #514

The comedian Emo Philips has a well-known joke about religion that may explain some of the decline in membership... "Once I saw this guy on a bridge about to jump. I said, "Don't do it!" He said, "Nobody loves me." I said, "God loves you. Do you believe in God?" He said, "Yes." I said, "Are you a Christian or a Jew?" He said, "A Christian." I said, "Me, too! Protestant or Catholic?" He said, "Protestant." I said, "Me…

It's weird how many Americans are completely unaware of the second largest branch of Christianity (or better call it "the trunk" and everything else - "a branch") - the Eastern Orthodox Church, which is the original Christianity without a pope, indulgences, inquisition, and other things, which have nothing to do with the early Christianity.

Prior to the East-West Schism, and from the beginnings of organized Christianity, the entities which became the Eastern Orthodox Churches after the schism had the same Pope, with a somewhat different role, as Western Christianity.

Some of them also have had things not unlike the inquisition, though they don't call it that.

And, of course, outside of the Eastern Orthodox and maybe the “Old Catholics”, even those Christians who disagree with the Roman Catholic position don't see the Eastern Orthodox as having a particular claim to original Christianity.

EDIT: for example, the Oriental Orthodox Churches and the Church of the East are, in their current form, older than the Eastern Orthodox, and from their perspective the branch containing both sides of the 1054 Schism is a divergence from “original Christianity” in the same way that Western Christianity is viewed by the Eastern Orthodox.,,

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