I've noted many times on this blog that the fastest growing segment of religious affiliation or identification if you want to use that terms is atheism and/or those who profess no religious affiliation. On Face the Nation today Andrew Sullivan noted this fact and what he and others believe is fueling the development:
Also on an earlier segment of the show was porcine blowhard and liar Cardinal Dolan of New York. Among Dolan's numerous lies was the claim that Catholicism is healthy and growing in the USA. The truth, of course, is something quite different. When Catholic immigrants are removed from the equation, the number of Catholics is dropping precipitously. But then, anyone expecting to hear the truth from the lips of Dolan - who is suspected of hiding Church assets rather than make payments to sexual abuse victims - is delusional to say the least. Dolan personifies why I left the Catholic Church well over a decade ago and why out of my extended family only or a few individuals remain church going Catholics.
"What has happened since 1960 is that organized groups, like the Southern Baptist Council and other religious groups, have in fact become self-consciously political. They have become fused with one political party, the Republican Party — a party that is now defined by a particular religious faith, evangelicalism or far-right Catholic hierarchy. And that is making many people feel that faith in Jesus is about politics and power and partisanship, in ways that’s turning off an entire generation. The biggest growth in any belief sector in this country in the last ten years has been atheism."
Also on an earlier segment of the show was porcine blowhard and liar Cardinal Dolan of New York. Among Dolan's numerous lies was the claim that Catholicism is healthy and growing in the USA. The truth, of course, is something quite different. When Catholic immigrants are removed from the equation, the number of Catholics is dropping precipitously. But then, anyone expecting to hear the truth from the lips of Dolan - who is suspected of hiding Church assets rather than make payments to sexual abuse victims - is delusional to say the least. Dolan personifies why I left the Catholic Church well over a decade ago and why out of my extended family only or a few individuals remain church going Catholics.
1 comment:
Michael, you know, as do your regular readers that I am an active Christian and have been all of my life.
I'm different from most Christians in think about my faith and I challenge my own faith and the pronouncements of the universal Christian church.
I was raised a Southern Baptist. My father was a leader in that church. Yet, by the time I was ten years old I knew I would not be a Baptist as an adult. While there are many fine people in the Baptist church they simply do not understand the true gospel of Christ as a whole.
Baptists are not alone in their failure to understand the gospel of Christ. Neither do Catholics, or Pentecostals or Churches of Christ. The list could go on and on.
What this means is just what you have quoted. The largest growth group for religion is those who consider themselves to be agnostic or atheistic.
This newly coined agnostics and atheists in many cases know more about the Gospel of Christ that does the church universal. And, they see that the church universal is hypocritical in that they espouse the gospel, but do not practice the gospel. They want nothing to do with such hypocrites.
Others who decided to become agnostic don't know crap about the gospel. They have simply been turned off by the shrillness and generally negative overtones of those who call themselves Christians.
Either way, it is the church that is killing itself. It is not be killed by others. In fact it is not even that people are leaving the church. Instead they are being pushed out because the church refuses to accept them as they are and nourish them in the love of Christ as human beings.
I believe in God and I believe that God's plan for the world will come to fulfillment. In the end the gospel of Christ will prevail.
I believe that just because people are turning away from the church does not mean they are not hungering for those things which the true gospel of Christ could provide for them.
It is much like people stopping their support of a football team that looses year after year. Fans eventually turn away. But when the team gets its act together and starts to do something that get the attention of the fans, the fans flock back to the stadiums.
Christians need to turn around. Especially the fundamental and evangelical Christians need to do some real studying and come to know the gospel of Christ rather than the gospel of political activism. When that happens, and it will happen. People will return to the church.
Jack Scott
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